Z57 


pi 


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UNIVERSITY  OF  CALIFORNIA 
AT   LOS  ANGELES 


How  to  /Wal<c  a  biving, 
KEY. 


.  o. 

LAWYtK 
,  TEXAS 


How  to  Make  a  Living. 

Arranged  for  Class  Dictation. 


S.  S.  PACKARD,  PUBLISHER, 
NEW  YORK. 


The  little  book,  written  by  George  Gary  P'.ggleston 
and  published  by  G.  P.  Putnam's  Sons,  by  whose  kind 
permission  we  were  able  to  publish  it  in  Munson 
Phonography  two  years  ago,  was  chosen  for  the  good 
advice  to  young  people  it  contains,  for  the  great  num- 
ber of  commercial  terms  used,  and  because  it  seemed 
to  be  the  best  exercise  in  ordinary  English  that  could 
be  found  at  the  time.  A  student  mastering  it  thor- 
oughly will  have  acquired  a  very  useful  vocabulary 
and  have  laid  a  good  foundation  for  more  advanced 
study.  It  is  intended  to  follow  the  Lessons  in  Munson 
Phonography  as  class  work.  The  Key  is  now  offered 
to  the  teachers  of  the  Munson  system,  and  to  self- 
teaching  students,  arranged  in  such  a  way  as  to  be 
useful  in  testing  speed  and  regulating  the  rate,  so  that 
it  may  not  be  spasmodic,  as  is  often  the  case  in  dicta- 
tion. The  number  of  words  is  marked  in  an  original 
and  it  is  believed  more  practical  way,  than  has 
before  been  devised. 


COPYRIGHT,  1896. 

s.  s. 


,—•"    .A     •/         S 

t=-J  A 


"HOW  TO  MAKE  A  LIVING.' 


CHAPTER  I. 

THE   VALUE   OF    MONEY. 

1 .  Every  bookkeeper  knows  that  tyros  in  his  business  find  nothing 
•^.  so  difficult  of  comprehension  as  the  nature  of  cash.     It 
3.  is  difficult  to  make  the  student  of  accounts  understand  that 
'   4.  cash  comes  by  purchase  like  any  other  merchandise — that  what 
5.  money  one  gets  one  must  pay  for,  and  that  there 
G.  is  an  exact  limit  to  the  value  of  dollars  and 

7.  cents,  which  must  be  kept  in  mind  in  purchasing  money 
f»  8.  with  other  things,  just  as  the  value  of  other  things 

u>  0.  must  be  kept  in  mind  when  they  are  to  be 

oclO.  bought  with  money.     With  the  young  bookkeeper  the  difficulty  is 

as 
aa 

1.  soon  mastered,  while  the  rest  of  us  are  apt  to 
t^   •->.  blunder  on  through  life  with  no  conception  of  the  real 
n   3.  relation  of  money  to  other  things.     We  express  values  in 
^   4.  terms  of  money,  and  so  we  come  to  regard  dollars 

5.  and  cents  as  constituting  an  invariable  standard  by  which  to 
u   G.  measure  everything  else.     A  unit  of  measure  gets  to  be, 
hj    7.  in  some  sort,  an  ultimate  fact;  and  we  take  it 

8.  as  a  starting-point.     The  pound,  the  foot,  the  gallon — these 
0.  we  know  are  fixed  measures,  and  we  are  apt  to 

10.  place  the  dollar  in  precisely  the  same  category  of  fixed 


452368 


HOW  TO  MAKE  A  LIVING. 


1.  things,  assign  to  it  a  certain  value;  and,  while  we 

2.  measure  everything  else  by  it,  let  it  go  without  any 

3.  measurement  at  all.     11  In  point  of  fact,  however,  money  is 

4.  not  of  fixed  and  certain  worth  at  all.     I  speak, 

5.  now,  not  of  paper  promises  to  pay,  which  are  always 

0.  reducible  to  their  value  in  gold,  but  of  gold  itself. 

7.  When  the  gold  dollar  will  buy  two  bushels  of  wheat, 

8.  and  other  things  in  proportion,  it  is  really  and  truly 

9.  worth  just  twice  as  much  as  it  is  when  it 

10.  will  buy  but  one  bushel.     In  other  words,  its  purchasing    . 

1.  capacity  is  the  real  measure  of  its  value.     Now,  this 

'I.  purchasing  capacity  varies  in  different  countries  and  at  different 

3.  in  the  same  country;  wherefore,  it  is  evident  the  real          [times 

4.  value  of  money  varies  at  different  times  and  in  different 

5.  places  quite  as  truly  as  does  the  value  of  any 

(>.  other  article  of  commerce.     And  it  varies  for  precisely  the 

7.  same  reason,  too.     If  the  cost  of  production, — that  is, 

8.  the  amount  of  labor  necessary  to  the  production  of  a 

9.  given  quantity  of  gold, — be  increased  or  diminished  without  a 
10.  corresponding  increase  or  diminution  in  the  cost  of  producing 

[other 

1.  things,  the  purchasing  power  (which  is  the  value)  of  gold 

i 

•i.   undergoes  a  change  at  once.     And  if  for  any  reason 

:>.  the  cost  of  producing  other  articles  of  daily  use  be  [cost 

4.  enhanced  or  diminished,  without  a  corresponding  change  in  the 

5.  of  gold  production,  there  must  be  a  proportionate  change  in 
('».  the  value,  as  there  is  in  the  purchasing  power  of 

7.  gold.     We  cannot  always  trace  these  results  to  their  ultimate 

8.  causes,  for  the  reason  that  there  may  be,  and  usually 
'.i.  is,  a  complexity  of  cause  which  baffles  us,  but  we 

10.  know  the  fact,  nevertheless,  that  the  value  of  money  is 


THE  VALUE   OF   MONEY. 


1.  measured  by  its  purchasing  power, — in  other  words,  that  money 

2.  is  worth  just  what  it  will  buy— no  more  and 

3.  no  less.     All  this  seems  simple  enough,  and  yet  it 

4.  is  a  fact  constantly  overlooked,  and  forgetfumess  of  it  is 

5.  a  fruitful  source  of  error  on  the  part  of  individuals 

6.  as  well  as  of  communities,  and  it  is  necessary  for 

7.  the  purposes  of  this  little  book  that  the  reader  shall 

8.  impress  upon  his  mind  in  the  outset  this  truth,  that 

9.  money  is  an  article  of  varying  value,  worth  what  it 

10.  will  buy,  and  no  more.     I'  It  seems  a  sufficiently  evident 

1.  truth  that  we  cannot  afford  to  pay  more  for  any 

2.  article  than  it  is  worth;  but  how  many  of  us 

3.  are  there  who  distinctly  and  constantly  recognize  the  fact  that 

4.  we  must  pay  for  what  money  we  get,  and  that 

5.  we  cannot  afford  to  pay  more  than  it  is  worth? 

6.  We  constantly  forget  that  we  get  literall}T  nothing  in  this 

7.  life  without  paying  for  it  in  some  way.     If  we 

8.  read  a  book  for  the  sake  of  the  information,  or 

9.  the  culture,  or  the  amusement  it  is  capable  of  giving 
10.  us,  we  must  pay  for  what  we  get  in  a 

1.  valuable  commodity,  time.     If  the  time  spent  in  reading  be 

2.  worth  less  to  us  than  the  culture,  or  the  information, 

3.  or  the  amusement  which  the  reading  brings,  we  do  well 

4.  to  purchase  at  the  price, — to  give  the  thing  of* 

5.  smaller  for  the  thing  of  greater  value.     And  this  is 

6.  true  of  everything  else.     We  cannot  have  money,  or  friends, 

7.  or  culture,  or  ease,  or  comfort,  or  amusement,  or  pleasure, 
^8.  or  any  other  desirable  thing  whatever,  without  paying,  in  one 

9.  way  or  another,  for  what  we  get;  and  so  it 
10.  becomes  our  duty  in  every  case  to  learn  accurately  the 


HOW   TO   MAKE   A   LIVING. 


1 .  value  of  the  coveted  thing,  and  the  price  we  must 
•-2.  pay  for  its  possession.     If  the  price  be  too  high, 
:>.  we  should  forego  the  desired  good,  as  one  which  we 

4.  cannot  afford  to  buy.     If,  on  the  other  hand,  the 

5.  thing  wanted  is  to  be  had  at  a  sufficiently  small 
i'i.  cost,  we  do  well  to  buy  it.     It  is  not 

7.  enough  that  the  thing  wished  for  shall  be  a  good 

8.  and  desirable  one.     It  must  be  better  and  more  desirable 
M.  than  that  which  we  must  give  in  exchange  for  it, 

10.  or  we  cannot  afford  to  purchase  it  at  all.     Books 

1.  are  good  things,  doubtless,  and  so  are  pictures  and  statuary. 

2.  Comfortable  homes  are  of  great  worth.     Travel  is  an  excellent 
:>.  educator.     All  these  and  a  hundred  other  things  are  desirable, 

4.  certainly;  but  they  can  only  be  had  at  a  certain 

5.  cost  in  time  or  money,  or  both,  and  the  question 

6.  whether  or  not  we  should  have  them  depends  wholly  upon 

7.  another  question,  whether  or  not  they  are  worth  to  us 

8.  more  than  their  cost.     There  is  no  doubt  of  their 

9.  desirability,  but  it  is  not  every  one  who  can  afford 
10.  them.     What  is  true  of  all  these  things  is  true 

1.  also,  and  equally,  of  money.     It  is  worth  something,  certainly. 

2.  It  is  worth  a  good  deal,  too,  but  it  is 

3.  not  worth  everything.     It  is  a  good  thing  to  have, 

4.  but  it  is  not  tKe  only  good,  or  even  the 

5.  chief  good,  to  be  sought  in  life.     Each  of  us 

('».   needs  it,  and  some  of  it  we  must  have,  but 

/ 

7.  there  is  a  limit  to  the  amount  of  it  which 

8.  we  can  afford  to  buy,  and  beyond  that  limit  we 

^».  may  not  wiselj'  go.     The  trouble  is,  commonly,  that  we 
10.  think  and  talk  about  making  money,  when  in  point  of 


THE  VALUE  OF  MONEY. 


1.  fact  we  do  nothing  of  the  kind.     Whatever  money  we 

2.  get  in  the  world  we  buy  quite  as  truly  and 

3.  quite  as  directly  as  we  buy  the  clothes  upon  our 

4.  backs.     Every  man  begins  life  with  certain  possessions.     These 

5.  his  muscles,  his  intellect,  his  skill  at  work  of  any  [are 

6.  kind,  his  education,  his  health,  his  energy,  his  character  and 

7.  whatever  property  he  may  happen  to  have  inherited.     With  these 

8.  he  must  buy  whatever  desirable  things  he  gets  in  life — 

9.  books,  houses,  money,  and  everything  else.  -  If  he  be  a 
10.  wise  man  he  will  take  care  not  to  pay  more 

1 .  for  any  of  these  than  he  can  afford ;  but  few 

2.  of  us,  unfortunately,  are  wise  in  this  regard.     Knowing  very 

3.  well  that  we  may  live  and  be  comfortable  with  small 

4.  possessions,  in  the  way  of  money  and  property,  nevertheless  we 

5.  overwork  ourselves  now  and  then, — paying  in  precious  health  a 

6.  price  we  cannot  afford  to  pay,  for  money  that  we 

?.  really  do  not  need;  or  we  sacrifice  something  of  character 

8.  for  the  sake  of  increasing  our  purchases  of  things  which 

9.  are  of  infinitely  smaller  worth;  or  we  starve  our  intellects 
10.  that  we  may  buy  more  wealth,  becoming  poor  that  we 

1.  may  seem  to  be  rich.     There  are  a  hundred  ways 

2.  in  which  we  are  constantly  liable  to  make  bad  bargains 

3.  in  purchasing  wealth,  and  the  very  first  lesson  in  economy 

4.  is  this :  Be  careful  that  you  do  not  buy  money, 

5.  or  its  equivalent,  at  too  high  a  price.     There  are 

6.  very  few  people  who  do  not  feel  the  need  of 

7.  more  money  and  property  than  they  have,  and  feeling  this 

8.  daily  and  hourly,  it  is  only  natural  that  we  should 

9.  come  to  think  of  money,  which  is  the  representative  of 
10.  all  property,  as  of  greater  worth  than  it  is.     We 


HOW  TO  MAKE  A   LIVING. 


1.  are  in  constant  danger,  therefore,  of  buying  it  at  too 

2.  high  a  price,  and  from  first  to  last  there  is 

3.  nothing  more  essential  than  that  we  shall  avoid  this  error. 

4.  To  do  this,  each  of  us  must  determine,  from  time 

5.  to  time,  how  much  money  he  can  afford  to  make. 

(i.   Beyond  the  necessity  of  providing  for  his  own  and  his 

7.  family's  absolute  wants,  the  making  of  money  becomes  a  mere 

8.  question  of  one's  ability  to  buy.     "  I  have  not  time 

(.i.   to  make  money,"  said  Agassiz,  and  with  all  his  ability 
10.  to  amass  a  fortune  almost  without  effort  he  died,  owning 

1.  nothing  except  his  library  and  a  mortgaged  homestead.     The 

2.  of  money  would  have  been  very  easy  to  him.     His  |  making 

3.  vast  store  of  knowledge  might  have  been  turned  into  popular 

4.  books  and  lectures,  almost  without  labor,  and  money  would  have 

5.  flowed  into  his  lap.     He  had  need  of  money,  too, 

»'».  and  could  have  used  it  to  better  advantage  than  most 

7.  men  can.     But  he  could  not  afford  to  buy  it. 

8.  The  cost  he  must  pay  for  it  was  time,  and 

9.  he  felt  that  to  be  more  precious  than  anything  else. 

10.  His  hours  were  worth  more  than  the  money  they  would 

1.  buy,  and  he,  being  a  wise  man,  refused  to  purchase 

2.  at  a  price  which  he  thought  too  high.     Time  is 

3.  not  so  valuable  to  every  man  as  it  was  to 

4.  him,  but  time  is  not  alwajTs  the  only  thing  one 

5.  must  pay,  and  there  are  but  very  few  of  us 

6.  who  do  not,  in  one  way  or  another,  pay  too 

7.  high  a  price  for  the  money  we  get  in  the 

8.  world, — very  few  who  do  not  buy  more  money  than 

9.  they  can  afford,  and  there  is  no  worse  extravagance  possible 
10.  than  this.     Each  of  us  has  certain  .aspirations  in  life. 


THE   VALUE  OF  MONEY. 


1.  There  are  certain  things  which  each  of  us  would  like  [sion 

2.  to  accomplish,  and  for  the  accomplishment  of  which  the  posses- 

3.  of  money  is  necessary.     For  the  most  part,  these  aspirations 

4.  are  worthy  ones,  or  at  least  not  unworthy.     But  their 

0.  accomplishment  is  not  absolutely  necessary  —  if  we  be  rightly 
G.  people  —  even  to  our  own  happiness,  and  we  must  be    [constituted 

7.  careful  not  to  let  our  zeal  for  these  things  mislead 

8.  us  as  to  their  value  and  the  value  of  the  [should 

9.  money  necessary  to  their  accomplishment.     But  above  all  we 
10.  never  forget  that  while  money  is  an  excellent  means,  it 

1.  never  can  be  a  worthy  end.     It  is  an  excellent 

2.  servant,  but  the  worst  of  all  possible  masters.     It  strengthens 
3  .  our  hands  for  all  purposes,  but  has  no  value  whatever 

4.  except  in  its  use.     Now  we  all  know  precisely  what 

5.  money  will  purchase,  and  so  we  have  an  exact  measure 
C.  of  its  worth  constantly  at  hand.     We  know  that  a 

7.  given  amount  of  it  will  enable  us  to  live  in 

8.  a  certain  way,  to  have  certain  comforts  and  luxuries,  to 

9.  indulge  certain  tastes,  to  relieve  a  certain  amount  of  distress, 
10.  to  accomplish  certain  desired  ends.     Knowing  this  and  knowing 

[precisely 

1.  how  desirable  it  is  to  live  in  this  way,  to 

2.  have  these  comforts  and  luxuries,  to  indulge  these  tastes  and 

3.  to  accomplish  these  ends,  we  have  only  to  ascertain  precisely 

4.  how  much  of  economy  and  of  labor,  how  much  of 

5.  self-sacrifice,  how  much  of  the  sacrifice  of  those  dependent  upon 

6.  us,  we  must  give,  —  in  short,  what  price  we  must 

7.  pay  for  these  things,  to  know  whether  or  not  we 

8.  can  afford  them.     If  we  can  accomplish  the  ends  we 

9.  have  set  before  us  at  reasonable  cost,  we  should  do 
10.  so  by  all  means.     If  we  cannot,  then  we  have 


10  HOW  TO  MAKE  A   LIVING. 


1.  no  right  to  accomplish  them  at  all.     We  are  in 
-.'.  that  case,  precisely  in  the  predicament  of  a  man  who 
:!.  wishes  to  live  in  a  costly,  well-appointed  house,  but 
1.  is  without  the  money  necessary  to  pay  for  the  luxury. 
5.  *[  The  truth  is  that  most  of  us  make  more  money 
<;.  than  we  can  afford.     We  begin  by  spending  too  much, 
1 .   indulging  extravagant  tastes,  and  living  in  a  style  which  requires 
*.  not  more  money,  perhaps,  than  we  can  make,  but  more 
'.».  than  we  can  afford  to  make.     In  order  that  we 
1 0.  may  do  this  we  overtax  our  strength  in  work ;  deny 

1 .  ourselves  needed  rest ;  pinch  our  souls  in  a  hundred  ways ; 

-.'.   i  mpoverish  our  minds ;  deny  ourselves  the  advantages  of  reading, 

3.  study  and  travel ;  and  sometimes  cut  short  our  lives.    Can  [leisure, 

4.  there  be  doubt  that,  in  all  such  cases,  we  pay 

5.  more  for  the  thing  we  get  than  it  is  worth? 
(i.  It  should  be  our  care,  then,  not  to  set  before 

7.  ourselves  too  great  a  task  in  life.    -We  should  begin 

8.  with  small  ends  in  view,  and  allow  our  purposes  to 

9.  widen  when  the  means  for  their  accomplishment  shall  be  ours. 
10.  We  should  beware  of  creating  an  artificial  necessity  for  money 

1.  lest  that  necessity  lead  us  to  buy  the  commodity  at 

2.  an  extravagant  price.     In  this,  as  in  everything  else,  it 

3.  is  of  the  utmost  importance  that  we  shall  decide  in 

4.  advance  what  we  intend  doing  in  life.     A  vague  purpose 

5.  to  make  a  good  deal  of  money,  and  do  a 

6.  good  many  other  things,  is  about  the  worst  one  with 

7.  which  it  is  possible  to  begin  life.     As  a  rule, 

8.  he  that  does  two  things  will  do  neither  well,  and 

'.».  it  is  imjxH-tant  that  every  young  man  shall  determine  precisely 
10.  to  what  end  he  will  live.     In  this  country  one 


.THE   VALUE   OF  MONEY.  11 


1.  can  'make  money  in  considerable  quantities,  if  he  devote  himself 
'2.  to  the  task  to  the  exclusion  of  everything  else,  but 

3.  it  is  by  no  means  easy  for  one  to  become 

4.  rich,  while  he  is  accomplishing  anything  else.     If  you  would 

0.  become  learned,  your  time  and  your  energies  must  be  given 

6.  to  the  task  of  acquiring  knowledge.     If  you  desire  to 

7.  make  a  name  for  yourself,  you  must  add  attention  and 
s.  industry  to  what  talent  or  genius  you  may  have,  and 
9.  pay  the  whole  for  the  reputation  you  seek.     If  you 

10.  would  be  rich,  you  must  deny  yourself  all  other  good 

1.  things, — you  must  give  your  days  and  nights,  your  thoughts, 

2.  your  energies,  to  the  making  of  money;  you  must  restrain 
:>.  your  hand  when  you  would  be  generous  in  almsgiving;  you 

4.  must  deny  yourself  luxuries  and  comforts;  you  must  forego  most 

5.  of  the  pleasures  of  life,  and  devote  yourself  wholly  to 
(!.  the  one  task  of  getting  and  keeping  money.     This  is 
^ .  the  price  which  most  of  us  must  pay  if  we 

8.  would  be  rich,  and  it  is  the  price,  too,  which 

0.  most  men,  who  have  become  rich,  have  paid.     There  are 
10.  exceptional  cases  now  and  then,  but  they  are  too  rare 

! .  to  be  taken  into  account  in  this  place.     As  a 

•>.  rule,  one  must  forego  the  thought  of  becoming  rich,  if 

:>.  he  would  accomplish  anything  else  in  the  world,  and  the 

4.  choice  ought  to  be  made  at  the  start.     The  trouble 
o.  is,  that  many  of  us  are  constantly  trying  to  get 

ii.  wealth  and  hoping  to  get  it,  while  we  steadily  refuse 

* .  to  pay  the  price.     We  even  allow  ourselves  to  grow 

5.  unhappy,  sometimes,  over  our  failure  to  get  that  for  which 
'.».  we  deliberately  refuse  to  pay.     We  live  in  a  style 

10.  which  we  can  well  enough  afford,  perhaps,  but  which  precludes 


12  HOW  TO   MAKE  A  LIVING. 


1.  the  possibility  of  amassing  a  fortune;  we  indulge  tastes  which 

2.  are  altogether  commendable,  but  which  cost  us  a  good  deal 
:>.  in  time,  money,  attention  or  energy;  we  open  our  hands 

4 .  to  the  needy,  as  we  ought,  but  as  we  cannot 

5.  afford  to  do  if  we  are  to  become  rich ;  we 

<;.  pursue  studies  which  enrich  our  minds,  at  cost  of  neglecting 

0 

7.  the  getting  of  money;  we  entertain  our  friends,  and  keep 

8.  our  families  in  comfort,  which  is  right  and  proper,  but 

9.  is  not  at  all  the  way  to  make  a  great 

10.  deal  of  money;  and  having  thus  used  our  means  in 

1.  buying  innumerable  good  things,  we  grumble  at  our  inability  to 

2.  purchase  that  wealth  for  which,  if  we  are  to  have 
:>.  it  at  all,  we  must  forego  all  these  things.     Nothing 

4.  is  commoner  than  this,  and  nothing  could  be  more  unreasonable. 

5.  We  cannot  eat  our  cake  and  have  our  cake,  and 
C>.  it  is  the  part  of  wisdom  to  decide  whether  we 

7.  shall  eat  or  keep  it.     If  you  set  wealth  before 

8.  you  as  the  object  of  life,  the  way  is  open 

9.  and  evident  to  the  attainment  of  your  end.     You  have 

10.  only  to  surrender  all  other  objects ;  work  without  regard  to 

1.  anything  else;  make  all  the  money  you  can,  and  keep 
•.'.  all  you  make;  stint  your  body  and  starve  your  soul. 

3.  The  mere  accumulation  of  money  by  these  means  is  easy 

4.  and  certain,  but  the  price  you  must  pay  is  an 

5.  outrageously  high  one.     Yet  it  is  the  price  which  ninety -nine. 

6.  men  in  a  hundred  must  pay  if  they  would  have 

7.  wealth.     It  is  far  better  to  abandon  the  idea  of 
&  getting  rich  and  to  devote  one's  self  to  a  higher 

'•'.  purpose  from  the  beginning.     But  some  money  we  must  have, 
10.  and  the  question  each  should  decide  for  himself  in  beginning 


THE  DUTY  AND  THE    DANGER  OF  MAKING   MONEY. 


1.  life  is,  How  much  money  can  I  afford  to  make? 

2.  The  answer  will  depend  upon  several  other  things.     In  the 

3.  first  place,  you  must  ascertain  what  your  money-making  capac- 

[ity  is — 

4.  not  in  a  vague,  uncertain  way,  but  positively.     Knowing  this 

5.  you  must  determine  also  how  much  money  you  will  be 

6.  required  to  spend  in  living,  as  you  purpose  living,  and 

7.  the  difference  will  be  the  amount  you  can  afford  to 

8.  save.     An  intelligent  conception  of  one's  purpose  in  life,  kept 

9.  steadily  in  view,  will  go  a  great  way  toward  solving 
10.  the  problem  of  happiness  or  misery.     It  puts  an  end 

1.  to  vague  longing  and  precludes  discontent.     It  enables  one  to 

2.  accomplish,  at  least  approximately,  the  end  he  has  set  before 

3.  him,  and  so  makes  of  him  a  satisfied  instead  of 

4.  a  disappointed  man.     It  puts  fancy  in  harness  and  makes 

5.  her  help  to  draw  the  load. 


CHAPTER   II. 

THE  DUTY  AND  THE  DANGER  OP  MAKING  MONEY. 

1.  Having  determined  how  much  money  you  are  capable  of  mak- 

2.  how  much  you  wish  to  make,  and  how  much  you  [ing? — 

3.  can  afford  to  make,  it  remains  to  be  decided  how 

4.  much  you  have  a  right  to  make,  for  in  this 

5.  every  man  is  subject  to  a  limitation  which  he  may 

6.  not  transcend  without  wronging  himself   and  defrauding  the 

7.  its  just  dues.     There  can  be  no  more  positive  error         [world  of 

8.  than  the  common  thought,  that  every  man  has  a  right 

9.  to  make  all  the  money  he  can  by  honest  methods. 
10.  Life  brings  duties  with  it,  as  well  as  privileges,  and 


14  HOW  TO  MAKE  A  LIVING. 


1.  every  man  owes  the  world  a  debt  which  he  must 
-.'.   pay  if  he  would  be  truly  and  perfectly  honest.     To 
:!.  refuse  payment  in  this  case  is  as  positively  a  failure 

4.  in  honesty  as  to  neglect  it  in  any  other.     Every 

5.  man  owes  it  to  the  world  to  do  the  very 

»;.   l>est  work  of  which  he  is  capable.     We  live  in 
', .  daily  <-n joymont  of  a  civilization  wrought  out  by  those  who 
s.  have  gone  before  us,  and  in  enjoyment  also  of  the 
5i.  results  of  the  work  done  by  our  fellows  still  living. 
10.  The  world  gives  us  all  these  things,  and  in  return 

1.  we  cannot  honestly  refuse  to  render  our  own  best  service. 
-.'.   Disguise  the  fact  as  we  may,  the  family  of  mankind 

3.  is  a  community,  each  individual  sharing,  in  one  way  or 

4.  another,  the  work  of  all  the  rest.     No  man  has 

5.  a  right,  therefore,  to  devote  himself  so  exclusively  to  the 
G.  task  of  making  money,  as  to  neglect  the  doing  of 

7.  his  best  work  in  the  world,  or  to  unfit  himself 

8.  for  its  doing.     The  force  of  this  is  felt  most 

9.  strongly  when  one  comes  to  determine  what  his  business  shall 
10.  be.     Professor  Agassiz  was  bred  a  physician,  and  might  have 

1.  made  the  practice  of  his  profession  much  more  lucrative  than 

2.  he  could  ever  hope  to  make  the  work  he  chose 

3.  to  do  in  the  world.     But  while  he  might  have 

4.  been  a  useful  and  prosperous  man,  writing  prescriptions  in 

5.  European  city,  he  would,  in  that  case,  have  defrauded  the 
G.  world  not  only  of  the  scientific  discoveries  he  made,  but 

7.  also  of  the  museum  at  Harvard,  one  of  the  completest 

8.  natural  history  collections  in  the  world,  which  was  built  up 
(.i.  almost  exclusively  by  his  labor.     We  should  have  lost,  too, 

li>.  the  influence  he  has  exerted  upon  the  educational  system  of 


THE  DUTY  AND  THE  DANGER  OF  MAKING  MONEY.      15 


1.  our  country;  the  school  at  Fenikese;  the  hunger  and  thirst 

2.  for  scientific  information  which  are  working  a  revolution  not  in 

3.  our  schools  only,  but  in  our  lives  as  well.     The 

4.  world  would  have  lost  all  these  merely  that  Louis  Agassiz 

5.  might  accumulate  a  few  thousands  of  dollars.     And  the  rule 

6.  we  apply  to  his  case  is  applicable  to  all.     It 

7.  is  given  to  few  men  to  accomplish  the  tenth  part 

8.  of  that  which  he  did,  but  every  man  may  do 

(J.  far  more  if  he  choose  his  work  wisely  and  conscientiously, 

10.  than  if  he  determine  it  merely  by  the  test  of 

1.  its  pecuniary  productiveness.     Besides  the  general  duty  of  every 

2.  to  do  the  work  for  which  nature  has  best  fitted  [man 

3.  him,  every  man  owes  it  to  himself  so  to  choose 

4.  his  business  as  to  secure  the  largest  inteUectual  and  moral 

5.  growth,  and  the  greatest  degree  of  happiness  to  himself  and 

6.  to  those  around  him.     All  these  things  should  have  their 

7.  weight  not  only  in  the  choice  of  a  business,  but 

8.  equally  in  its  pursuit,  and  all  these  things  limit  the 

9.  right  of  a  man  to  make  money.     The  general  principle 
10.  involved  may  be  stated  in  a  few  words,  as  follows: 

1.  It  is  the  duty  of  every  one  to  make  money 

2.  enough  to  supply  the  reasonable  wants  of  himself  and  of 

3.  those  dependent  upon  him.     It  is  his  privilege  to  make 

4.  as  much  more  as  he  can  without  sacrificing  worthier  ends. 

5.  The  application  of  this  principle  will  be  seen  in  subsequent 

6.  chapters,  and  in  its  application  to  individual  cases  it  leads 

7.  to  various  results.     It  prompted  Agassiz,  as  we  have  already 

8.  seen,  to  forego  the  easy  accumulation  of  money  in  order 

9.  that  he  might  do  that  for  which  he  was  so 

10.  eminently  fitted,  and  which  the  world  so  greatly  needed.     On 


16  HOW  TO  MAKE  A  LIVING. 

1.  the  other  hand,  such  men  as  Stephen  Girard  and  Peter 

2.  Cooper  have  been  impelled,  by  identically  the  same  principle,  to 

3.  the  laborious  accumulation  of  enormous  wealth,  with  which  alone 

[their 

4.  equally  excellent  work  might  be  done.     Had  Agassiz  made  money, 

5.  his  work  must  have  been  neglected.     To  Girard  and  Cooper 

6.  the  making  of  money  was  an  essential  part  of  the 

7.  task  set  them.     T  There  are  so  many  pleasant  things  connected 

8.  with  the  possession  of  wealth,  and  man  is  so  prone 

9.  to  think  those  things  good  which  are  agreeable,  that  every 
10.  one  of  us  is  in  danger  of  magnifying  both  the 

1.  duty  and  the  privilege  of  accumulation.     We  are  apt  to 

2.  think  ourselves  best  fitted  for  those  things  at  which  we 

3.  can  most  readily,  and  most  surely,  make  money,  and  here 

4.  is  a  danger  to  be  avoided.     Without  doubt,  our  ability 

5.  to  make  a  calling  profitable  is,  in  some  sense,  and 

6.  to  some  extent,  a  measure  of  our  fitness  for  it; 

7.  but  that  it  is  not  always  a  correct  measure  is 

8.  evident.     There  is  another  danger,  too,  to  be  guarded  against, 

9.  namely,  that  as  our  accumulations  increase,  the  desire  to  accumu- 
10.  will  grow  with  them,  until  it  becomes  a  genuine  passion,      [late 

1.  in  which  case  it  is  sure  to  override  every  other 

2.  consideration,  and  to  make  of  us  mere  machines  for  making 

3.  money,  than  which  no  fate  can  well  be  worse.     The 

4.  birth  and  growth  of  this  passion  is  almost  always  imperceptible, 

5.  and  hence  it  is  one  that  can  be  guarded  against 

6.  only  by  the  utmost  watchfulness  of  an  alert  conscience.     To 

7.  avoid  it  with  certainty,  one  must  keep  constant!}'  in  view 

8.  the  purposes  for  which  he  is  making  money,  never  allowing 

9.  himself  for  a  moment  to  regard  the  money  itself  as 

10.  an  end  worth  working  for.     These  general  principles  are  not 


THE   DUTY   AND   THE   DANGER   OF   MAKING    MONEY.  17 


1.  in  any  sense  new.     They  have  been  stated  so  often 

2.  that  I  should  gladly  omit  them  here  but  for  the 

3.  fact  that  they  are  constantly  neglected  in  practice.     Upon  them 

4.  rests  the  whole  body  of  the  ethics  of  money-making,  which 

5.  in  oar  country,  at  least,  involves  almost  all  there  is 

G.  of  ethics.     Their  statement  here  is  necessary,  too,  as  a 

7.  foundation  for  what  follows.     It  is  necessary  for  the  reader 

8.  to  understand  at  the  outset  the  point  of  view  from 
'.i.  which  we  are  to  consider  our  subject,  and  to  this 

1 0.  end  I  recapitulate  the  principles  upon  which  this  little  treatise 

1 .   rests,  as  follows :  first,  it  is  both  the  right  and 

'2.  the  duty  of  every  man  to  make  money  enough  to 

').  supply  the  reasonable  wants  of  himself  and  his  family.     Second, 

4.  it  is  the  right  and,  in  some  sense,  the  duty 

5.  of  every  man  to  make  as  much  more  money  as 

G.  he  can,  consistently  with  his  obligations  to  himself,  his  family, 

7.  and  the  world  at  large;  third,  every  man  must  pay 

8.  for  whatever  money  he  gets,  and  the  price  of  wealth 
!>.  is  very  much  greater  than  most  men  can  afford  to 

10.  pay,  and  much  greater  than  most  men  are  willing  to 

1.  pay;  fourth,  money  is  good  as  a  means  to  the 

2.  accomplishment  of  worthy  ends,  but  as  itself  an  end,  it 

:».  is  utterly  unworthy  of  human  effort ;  wherefore  its  pursuit,  except 
4.  as  a  means,  must  of  necessity  be  debasing. 
2 


18  HOW  TO   MAKE  A  LIVING. 


CHAPTER   III. 

THE   CHOICE   OF   A   BUSINESS. 

1.  An  especially  important  part  of  every  man's  career  is  its 

2.  beginning,  upon  which,  in  a  great  degree,  depends  the  prosperity 

3.  of  the  man  throughout.     The  choice  of  a  business  determines 

4.  the  life  of  a  man.     It  limits  him  on  every  [sometimes ;  it 

5.  hand,  moulding  him  physically,  intellectually,  and  even  morally 

6.  determines  how  much  and  what  kind  of  work  he  shall 

7.  do,  how  much  leisure  he  shall  have,  what  books  he 

8.  may  read,  what  his  associations  are  to  be,  and  in 

9.  a  hundred  other  ways  affects  his  daily  life  to  the 

10.  end,  and  shapes  his  character  more  certainly  than  even  his 

1.  previous  education  has  done.     It  is,  therefore,  of  the  utmost 

2.  importance  that  every  one  shall  choose  his  business  wisely,  di-ter- 

3.  the  question  not,  as  is  ordinarily  done,  upon  caprice  or     [mining 

4.  under  the  influence  of  accidental  circumstances,  but  upon  a  just 

5.  estimate  of  his  fitness  for  the  business  and  the  fitness 

6.  of  the  business  for  him.     So  to  choose  is  to 

7.  avoid  nearly  half  the  errors  which  embitter  human  life.     So 

8.  to  choose  is  to  insure  the  spending  of  life  profitably, 

9.  worthily,  and,  for  the  most  part,  agreeably.     Of  an  unwise 

10.  choice  comes  failure,  probably — inefficiency  and  discontent,  cer- 

[tainly.     To  choose 


THE  CHOICE   OF  A   BUSINESS.  19 


1.  wisely,  one  must  know  himself  as  thoroughly  as  possible,  and 

2.  must  govern  his  decision  by  correct  principles,  taking  care  that 

3.  mere  fancy  shall  have  nothing  whatever  to  do  with  it, 

4.  and  that  no  misapprehension  of  facts  shall  mislead  him.     A 

5.  misstep  is  fatal  in  most  cases,  and  a  source  of 

6.  ill  always.     T  The  first  point  to  be  considered,  in  the 

7.  choice  of  a  business,  is  your  ability  to  earn  a 

8.  proper  livelihood  in  its  pursuit.     If  it  does  not  give 

9.  a  reasonable  promise  of  that,  it  is  no  fit  business 
10.  for  you  in  any  case.     The  laborer  is  worthy  of 

1.  his  hire,  and  you  have  no  right  to  withhold  the 

2.  hire,  even  though  you  be  yourself  the  laborer  in  question. 

3.  The  world  does  not  "owe  you  a  living,"  as  the 

4.  phrase  goes,  but  you  owe  it  to  the  world  to 

5.  earn  a  living  for  yourself.     You  must  live  somehow,  and 
(j.  have  no  right  to  live  upon  the  product  of  other 

7.  labor  than  your  own.     It  is  necessary  also  to  consider 

8.  whether  or  not  the  business  is  likely  to  yield  more 

9.  than  a  living.     Money  in  excess  of  one's  actual  needs 

10.  is  a  powerful  agent  greatly  increasing  one's  capacity  for  good 

1.  work.     Other  things  being  equal,  that  business  is  best  which 
-.'.   will  certainly  yield  a  support  and  is  likely  to  yield 

3.  the  largest  surplus.     But  in  order  that  other  things  shall 

4.  be  equal,  several  conditions  must  be  satisfied.     As  we  have 

5.  already  seen,  the  world  is  entitled  to  your  very  best 

6.  work,  and  in  choosing  between  all  the  avocations  which  satisfy 

7.  the  first  condition  set  down  above,  it  is  the  imperative 

8.  duty  of  every  man  to  choose  the  one  in  following 

9.  which  he  is  likely  to  do  the  best  work.     And 
10.  by  one's  best  work  we  do  not  mean  work  in 


20  HOW  TO  MAKE  A  LIVING. 


1.  the  most  dignified  and  so-called  "  respectable"  employment  he  can 

2.  but  the  best  work  he  can  do  of  any  kind.  [follow^ 

3.  It  is  far  better  to  make  particularly  good  horse  shoes 

4.  than  to  practise  law  or  medicine  only  tolerably  well.     The 

5.  man  to  whom  nature  has  given  a  genius,  or  even 

0.  a  talent  for  mechanics,  positively  wrongs  his  fellow-men  when  he 

7.  chooses  to  devote  himself  to  a  business  in  which  he 

8.  is  less  able  to  excel.     No  man  has  a  right 

0.  to  spoil  a  good  blacksmith  or  carpenter  for  the  sake 

10.  of  making  an  indifferent  physician,  or  clergyman,  or  attorney.    It 

1 .  is  the  duty  of  every  man  to  ascertain  as  nearly 

2.  as  possible  what  talents  he  has, — for  what  he  is 

3.  best  fitted,  and  to  choose  his  employment  accordingly.     There  is 

4.  a  joy  in  doing  the  thing  for  which  we  are 

5.  fitted  that  no  man  can  know  whose  work  is  less 

6.  truly  in  harmony  with  his  nature.     The  market  is  always 

7.  overstocked  with  middling  work  of  all  sorts,  while  first  rate 

8.  work  in  every  department  of  human  effort  is  always  so 

0.  scarce  as  to  command  high  prices.    Every  newspaper  editor,  every 
10.  merchant,  every  manufacturer,  every  employer  of  any  sort,  in- 

[deed,  is: 

1.  constantly  overwhelmed  with  applications  from  people  who  are 

[capable  of 

2.  doing  tolerably  good  work,  while  every  employer  knows  that  when 

3.  he  has  need  of  a  man  capable  of  really  first 

4.  rate  performance,  he  must  search  diligently  for  him,  and  pay 

5.  him  a  high  price  when  he  is  found.     Now,  the 

6.  men  who  become  capable  of  this  sort  of  work  are 

7.  those,  and  those  only,  who  have  devoted  themselves  to  the 

8.  business  for  which  they  are,  by  nature  and  education,  perfectly 
0.  fitted.     Your  physical  fitness  for  the  business  must,  likewise,  be 

10.  considered.     You  have  no  more  right  to  commit  indirect  than 


THE   CHOICE   OF  A   BUSINESS.  21 


1.  direct  suicide.     You  owe  it  to  yourself  and  to  the 

2.  world,  which  has  need  of  you,  to  live  out  your 

3.  full  measure  of  life,  in  health  and  in  working  condition, 

4.  as  far  as  the  matter  is  within  your  control.     If 

5.  there  be  that  in  your  constitution,  or  in  the  history 

6.  of  your  family  which  indicates  a  liability  upon  your  part 

7.  to  particular  classes  of  disease,  you  have  no  right  to 

8.  presume  upon  your  present  health,  or  upon  chance  good  fortune 

9.  in  choosing  a  business,  the  pursuit  of  which  will  add 
10.  to  the  danger  or  diminish  the  safeguards  against  it.     In 

1.  like  manner,  if  you  are  likely  at  any  time  to 

2.  be  a  married  man,  it  becomes  your  duty  in  choosing 

3.  your  avocation  to  recognize  the  claims  of  wife  and  children 

4.  upon  your  time  and  society.     There  are  professions  and  trades, 

5.  as  everybody  knows,  which  no  married  man  can  follow  without 

6.  unjustly  depriving  his  family  of  the  companionship  which  every 

7.  owes  as  an  imperative  debt  to  those  who  constitute  his         [man 

8.  household.     The  man  who  is  likely  ever  to  marry  has 

9.  no  more  right  to  adopt  one  of  these  callings  than 
10.  he  has  to  provide  in  any  other  way  for  the 

1.  discomfort  of  his  family.     It  is  especially  desirable  that  you 

2.  shall  find  your  level.     A  large  percentage  of  life's  failures 

3.  and  many  of  life's  miseries  are  due  to  the  persistent 

4.  attempts  of  people  to  do  things  for  which  they  are 

5.  not  fitted.     A  blunder  of  this  kind  at  the  outset 

6.  is  almost  sure  to  embarrass  one  through  life.     There  are 

7.  hundreds  of  people  who,  by  dint  of  favor  shown  and 

8.  by  the  unwise  assistance  of  friends,  manage  to  waste  a 

9.  life  in  the  doing  of  poor  work  for  poor  pay, 

10.  while  they  might  be  doing  excellent  work  of  some  other 


22  HOW  TO   MAKE  A  LIVING. 

1.  sort,  and  living  a  life  of  personal  independence  and  manliness. 

2.  The  trouble  comes  mostly  from  a  mistaken  notion  of  respectability. 

3.  There  is,  even  in  our  democratic  country,  a  feeling  that 

4.  certain  callings  are  in  some  way  more  respectable  than  others, 

5.  and,  unmanly  as  this  feeling  is,  it  misleads  thousands  to 

<;.  their  ruin.     In  so  far  as  it  refers  to  the  [asmuch  as 

7.  learned  professions  we  may  readily  understand  the  prejudice,  in- 

8.  the  successful  pursuit  of  these,  of  necessity,  implies  the  possession 

9.  of  both  intellectual  strength  and  culture,  and  these  are  matters 
10.  worthily  held  in  universal  esteem.     There  is  genuine  dignity  and 

1.  honor  in  the  pursuit  of  callings  of  this  kind,  provided 

..'.  the  pursuit  be  successful.     The  dignity  and  honor  belong  not 

.'!.  to  the  professions,  but  to  the  intellectual  qualifications  necessary  to 

1 .  their  successful  following.    There  is  no  honor  in  unworthily  doing 

5.  anything.     The  practice  of  a  profession  without  the  necessary 

[qualifications 

6.  only  serves  to  emphasize  their  absence,  and  so  the  man 

7.  who  seeks  honor  by  entering  a  profession  for  which  he 

8.  is  unfit,  secures  contempt  instead.     But  the  prejudice  which  holds 

9.  certain  callings  more  honorable  or  more  respectable  than  others 
10.  not  confine  itself  by  any  means  to  the  drawing  of  [does 

1.  a  line  between  those  professions  which  presuppose  culture,  and 

2.  which  do  not.     The  idea  seems  not  an  uncommon  one         [those 

3.  that  it  is  in  some  way  more  respectable  to  sell 

4.  goods  over  a  counter  than  to  follow  a  mechanical  pursuit, 

5.  or,  in  general  terms,  that  those  avocations  which  may  be 

<5.  followed  in  broadcloth  are  more  dignified  than  those  which  may 

7.  not.     That  these  distinctions  are  not  founded  in  reason  becomes 

8.  evident  the  moment  one  tries  to  trace  them  to  their 

9.  origin;  but  that  they  serve  to  mar  many  lives  which  . 

10.  might  be  useful  ones,  is  unquestionably  true.     There  must  be 


THE  CHOICE  OF  A   BUSINESS.  23 


1.  salesmen  in  our  dry  goods  stores,  of  course,  but  the 

•2.  demand  is  alwaj^s  greater  for  skilled  than  for  unskilled  labor, 

0.  and  the  supply  is  always  in  an  inverse  ratio.     The 

4.  mechanic  has  a  technical  culture— a  skill  gained  by  years 

5.  of  patient  study, — which  the  other  has  not,  and  the 
i'>.  possession  of  such  a  culture  is  a  just  ground  for 

?.  honest  pride,  as  well  as  a  sure  guaranty  against  poverty. 

8.  In  short,  while  all  honest  work  is  honorable  and  dignified, 

9.  the  skill  of  the  mechanic,  which  is  in  itself  culture, 
10.  is  a  worthy  subject  of  pride,  and  other  things  being 

1.  equal,  the  mechanic  is  superior  in  fact  to  the  unskilled 
•.'.  worker.     He  can  do  a  higher  kind  of  work,  and 

3.  he  is  a  more  thoroughly  educated  man,  in  his  fustian, 

4.  than  is  his  fellow  in  broadcloth,  who  lacks  his  technical        [this 
o.  knowledge.     There  is  still  another  mistake  commonly  made  in 
i).  matter.     It  is  not  the  erroneous  notion  of  respectability  alone 

t\  which  leads  so  many  young  men  who  ought  to  know 

8.  a  trade  into  clerkships  and  salesmen's  positions  instead.     There  is 

0.  a  prevalent  belief  among  young  men  that  there  are  more         [cal 
10.  and  better  chances  for  advancement  in  commerce  than  in  mechani- 

1.  pursuits.     Half  the  young  men  who  seek  city  clerkships  look 
•2.  confidently  for  the  coming  of  a  time  when  they  shall 

3.  be  merchants  011  their  own  account.     They  ponder  the  stories 

4.  of  men  who,  beginning  as  office  boys,  have  become  chief 

5.  clerks,  junior  partners,  and  ultimately  even  the  seniors  in  great 
G.  houses,  until  these  come  to  represent,  in  their  eyes,  the 

T.  ordinary  and  probable  course  of  affairs.     They  forget  that  success 

8.  of  this  kind  can  come  to  but  one  man  out 

9.  of  many  thousands,  and  that  when  it  does  come  it 

10.  is  the  result  of  something  more  than  mere  chance.     To 


24  HOW  TO   MAKE  A   LIVING. 

1.  a  young  man  with  capital  in  reserve,  or  with  its  [ity  a 

•  2.  equivalent  in  influence,  or,  still  better,  with  extraordinary  capar- 

3.  clerkship  may  oft'er  a  reasonable  prospect  of  ultimate  advance  - 

[int'iit,  but 

4.  without  one  or  another  of  these  conditions,  the  chances  are 

5.  more  than  one  to  a  thousand  that  he  will  never 

G.  succeed  in  making  more  than  a  bare  support  for  himself. 

7.  The  mechanic,  on  the  other  hand,  brings  a  definite  skill 

8.  to  bear  upon  money  making.     Only  those  who  are  similarly 

9.  skilled  can  compete  with  him  for  employment..    His  skill  is 
10.  a  positive  capital,  and  his  work  is  always  productive.     There 

1.  are  few  "  brilliant"  opportunities  open  to  him,  though  there  are, 

2.  in  reality,  quite  as  many  as  there  are  to  the 

3.  salesman  or  clerk;  but  he  knows  definitely  how  to  do 

4.  something  which  other  men  must  have  done,  and  which  they 

5.  cannot  do  themselves,  and  if  he  is  sober  and  industrious 

6.  he  is  always  sure  of  a  support,  while,  with  a 

7.  wise  economy,  he  may  almost  certainly  accumulate  a  comfortable 

8.  in  the  end.     In  skill  only  is  there  any  real  [surplus 

9.  safety  from  want.     Even  the  possession  of  wealth  is  not 
10.  half  so  sure  a  guaranty  against  poverty,  and  no  man 

1.  who  is  without  a  thorough  knowledge  of  some  business  is 

2.  ever  safe.     So  long  as  this  was  a  new  country, 

3.  with  undeveloped  resources  on  every  hand,  growing  wild,  as  it 

4.  were,  there  were  opportunities  which  no  longer  exist  for  the 

5.  easy  and  rapid  accumulation  of  wealth.     Almost  an}'  man  of 

6.  ordinarily  good  capacity  might  make  money  without  definite  skill, 

7.  while  that  was  the  case,  knowledge  of  some  business  was      [and 

8.  far  less  important  than  it  now  is  as  a  preparation 

9.  for  life.     When  every  man  who  could  turn  his  unskilled 
10.  hand  to  any  useful  thing  was  sure  to  find  work 


THE   CHOICE   OF  A   BUSINESS. 


1.  and  wages,  and  when  every  purchase  of  a  piece  of 

2.  land  included  a  possible  purchase  of  a  coming  city,  there 

3.  was  less  need  than  now  of  a  technical  education.     But 

4.  the  era  of  easy  money  getting  is  rapidly  passing  away. 

5.  The  work  of  developing  our  country's  resources  is  only  fairly 

6.  begun,  it  is  true,  but  it  is  so  well  begun 

7.  that  only  skilled  labor  is  wanted  in  its  further  accomplishment. 

8.  The  geography  of  our  land  is  already  definitely  planned,  and 

9.  men  of  wealth  have  anticipated  our  growth  by  many  decades 
10.  in  the  purchase  of  land  upon  which  towns  are  likely 

1 .  to  grow.     Skilled  workers  are  to  be  had  where  there 

2.  were  none  a  generation  ago,  and  they  inevitably  crowd  their 

3.  unskilled  fellows  from  the  places  which  eagerly  sought  them 

[heretofore. 

4.  Unskilled  brains  and  hands  found  abundant  and  remunerative 

[employment  when 

5.  there  were  no  others,  but  that  day  has  gone  by 

6.  forever,  and  the  young  man  who  can  offer  the  world 

7.  nothing  better  than  untrained  ability,  is  sure  now  to  be 

8.  left  standing  idle  in  the  market-place  because  no  man  has 

9.  hired  or  is  likely  to  hire  him.     The  ease  with 

10.  which  money  has  been  made  hitherto  by  people  without  definite 

1 .  skill,  has  bred  a  national  vice  in  this  regard,  and 

2.  nothing  less  than  a  generation  or  two  of  positive  suffering 

3.  will  cure  it  effectually.     But  every  man  may  avoid  it          [allow 

4.  for  himself.     The  indifference  with  which  young  men  habitually 

5.  themselves  to  drift  listlessly  into  avocations  for  which  they  are 

6.  by  nature  unfit;  the  confidence  with  which  they  trust  chance 

7.  to  do  for  them  that  which  they  should  do  for 

8.  themselves ;  and  the  blind  recklessness  with  which  they  neglect  to 

9.  acquire  a  skill  that  may  serve  them  in  their  life 
10.  struggle,  is  appalling.     If  the  author  of  this  little 


20  HOW  TO   MAKE  A  LIVING. 


1.  book  might  effectually  warn  his  readers  against  so  dangerous  a 

2.  course,  might  hope  to  carry  conviction  to  the  half  of 
'.>.  them  on  this  one  point,  he  might  fairly  rest  content. 

4.  Learn  a  regular  business  and  learn  it  well.     To  teach 

5.  that  alone  would  be  to  tell  j'oung  men  "  how  to 

'..  make  a  living.'*     Having  learned  a  business  it  is  almost 
I .  always  unwise,  sometimes  it  is  even  dangerous,  to  change  it 
8.  either  in  whole  or  in  part  for  any  other  calling. 
it.  It  is  not  at  all  probable  that  you  will  succeed 
10.  better  in  a  business  which  is  new  to  you  than 

1 .  in  the  one  you  understand,  and  so  long  as  that 

•I.  yields  you  a  support,  you  cannot  safely  surrender  it  for 

3.  something  else.     We  have  a  national  vice  in  this  regard 

4.  which  is  hardly  less  hurtful  and  dangerous  than  the  one 

5.  already  alluded  to,  and  it  is  a  result  of  precisely 

<!.  the  same  causes.     While  unskilled  workers  were  in  demand,  and 
?.  unskilled  labor  was  profitable,  it  was  safe  enough  and  often 
8.  advisable  to  substitute  one  occupation  for  another,  laboring  to 
U.  the  demand  of  the  day.     The  alteration  which  has  taken    [supply 
10.  place  in  the  character  of  our  country, — our  growth  from 

1.  the  condition  of  new  settlements  to  that  of  populous  states, 
•>.  has  wrought  a  change  in  all  this,  and  as  it 

3.  is  now  of  paramount  importance  that  every  man  shall  regularly 

4.  learn  a  business,  so  too  it  is  only  in  the 

5.  persistent  pursuit  of  the  business  learned  that  there  is  now 
»i.  any  safety.     The  temptation  to  change  is  often  a  very 

7.  strong  one,  and  it  comes  in  many  shapes.     The  danger    [callings. 

8.  lies  chiefly,  however,  in  the  specious  allurements  of  catch -penny 

9.  When  one  finds  his  own  avocation  a  plodding  one,  yielding 
10.  only  its  small  regular  wages,  the  temptation  to  change  is 


THE  CHOICE  OF  A   BUSINESS.  27 


1.  strong.     And  when  in  such  a  case  he  is  permitted 

2.  to  catch  a  glimpse  of  the  occasional  earnings  of  some 

3.  follower  of  a  precarious  business,  it  becomes  almost  irresistible. 

4.  such  a  case  it  is  well  to  remember,  first,  that  [In 

5.  so  much  in  a  day  is  not  so  much  every 

G.  day;  and  secondly,  that  for  every  man  who  succeeds  in 

7.  callings  of  this  sort,  at  least  ten  fail  utterly.     A 

8.  canvasser  who  makes  fifty  dollars  in  a  day  is  certain 

9.  to  speak  of,  the  fact,  but  he  is  equally  certain 

10.  not  to  say  anything  of  the  many  weary  days  whose 

1.  work  brought  nothing.     Of  the  canvassers  who  fail  entirely,  we 

2.  naturally  hear  nothing  at  all.     The  chances  of  success  in 

.3.  callings  of  this  general  character  (and  those  are  the  avocations 

4.  which  the  people  who  change  from  one  business  to  another 

5.  commonly  adopt)  are  very  much  smaller  than  the  chances  of 

6.  failure.     In  truth,  not  one  person  in  a  hundred  has 

7.  the  qualifications  necessary  to  win  tolerable  success  in  this  kind 

8.  of  work.     These  qualifications  are  inherent,  and  not  to  be 

9.  acquired  in  any  way.     Without  them  failure  is  simply  inevitable, 
10.  and  most  of  us  are  utterly  destitute  of  them ;  wherefore 

1 .  a  very  large  proportion  of  those  who  have  tried  business 

2.  of  this  kind,  have  failed  in  the  attempt.     Most  men 

:].  socm  prosperous  to  their  neighbors,  who  see  only  their  mode 

4.  of  life,  and  their  expenditures,  knowing  nothing  of  their  toil 

5.  or  of  the  economy  which  they  find  it  necessary  to 

6.  practise  in  private.     So,  too,  every  man-'s  work  seems  easier 

7.  and  more  agreeable  than  our  own,  simply  because  we  see 

8.  it  from  the  outside,  knowing  nothing  of  the  drudgery  incident 

9.  to  it,  the  difficulty  of  doing  it,  or  the  poverty 
10.  of  its  results  as  its  doer  knows  them.     Of  our 


28  HOW  TO  MAKE  A  LIVING. 


1.  own  work  we  tire  now  and  then,  and  when  we 

2.  do  we  exaggerate  its  difficulty  and  the  disagreeable  things  at- 

3.  it.     Its  results  are  much  smaller  than  we  have  hoped,      [tending 

4.  perhaps,  and  we  naturally  assume  that  they  are  smaller  than 

5.  those  attained  by  our  neighbor.     We  draw  unjust  comparison 
(j.  his  lot  or  his  work  and  our  own,  knowing  our  [between 

7.  own  perfectly  and  his  imperfectly.     Now  it  is  a  well-ascertained 

8.  fact  that  the  profits  of  different  handicrafts  do  not  materially 

9.  vary  from  one  standard,  and  it  is  safe  to  say 

10.  that  there  is  no  great  difference  between  the  net  results 

1.  of  all  the  different  avocations  open  to  any  one  man. 

•-.'.    In  other  words,  every  man's  money-getting  power  is  limited  by 

3.  his  character,  his  intellectual  capacity,  his  education,  and  his 

[capital. 

4.  These  enable  him  to  follow  any  one  of  certain  avocations, 

5.  and  his  earnings  will  be  substantially  the  same  whether  he 

6.  adopt  one  or  another  of  the  callings  open  to  him. 

7.  What  the  result  would  be  if  he  had  a  larger 

8.  capital,  or  a  better  education,  or  greater  capacity,  and  so 

9.  were  fitted  for  some  business  which  he  cannot  follow  at 
10.  ah1  as  he  is,  it  is  not  worth  while  to 

1.  inquire.     Such  as  he  is,  he  is  capable  of  making 

2.  a  certain  amount  of  money,  and  he  could  hardly  increase 

3.  the  amount  if  his  business  were  other  than  it  is. 

4.  To  change,  therefore,  from  one  of  the  businesses  open  to 

5.  him  to  another  which  cannot  pay  better,  is  useless  in 
'>.  any  case,  and  when  the  change  is  from  a  calling 

7.  in  which  the  man  is  an  expert  to  one  in 

8.  which  he  is  a  mere  tyro,  it  is  sheer  folly. 

9.  Now  and  then  one  does  benefit  himself  by  such  a 
10.  change,  and  this  fact  serves  to  tempt  others  all  the 


THE  CHOICE  OF  A  BUSINESS.  29 


1.  more  strongly.     But  cases  of  this  kind  are  rare  exceptions 

2.  to  a  well-nigh  .universal  rule,  and  when  they  occur  at 

3.  all  there  is  nearly  always  some  factor  involved  which  is 

4.  not  common  to  other  cases  at  all.     The  man  has 

5.  some  special  fitness  for  the  new  undertaking;  or  was  in 

6.  some  way  specially  unfitted  for  the  old;  or  he  is 

7.  a  man  of  more  than  ordinary  versatility ;  or  he  has 

8.  entered  upon  his  new  calling  under  peculiarly  favorable  auspices ; 

9.  as  is  sometimes  the  case,  pure  accident  has  come  to  [or 
10.  his  assistance.     Whatever  the  cause  of  his  success  ma}*  be 

1.  it  is  exceptional,  and  in  no  way  affects  the  rule 

2.  that  it  is  always  dangerous  nnd  often  disastrous  to  change 

3.  from  one  avocation  to  another.     If  one  is  not  succeeding 

4.  satisfactorily  in  the  business  which  he  knows,  he  may  safely 

5.  assume  that  he  will  find  it  still  more  difficult  to 

6.  succeed  in  one  which  he  does  not  know.     If  you 

7.  take  pains  to  make  yourself  absolute  master  of  your  business, 

8.  and  give  to  it  all  the  energy  you  have,  success 

9.  is  certain.     If  you  are  doing  listlessly  that  which  needs 
10.  to  be  done  earnestly,  you  have  only  to  rouse  yourself 

1 .  to  better  performance.     If  you  know  imperfectly  that  which  you 

2.  should  know  perfectly,  the  shortest  road  to  success  is  to 

3.  stick  to  your  work  until  you  shall  learn  to  do 

4.  it  with  a  master  hand.     It  is  not  the  best 

5.  class  of  workmen  in  any  calling  who  are  out  of      [fluctuations  of 

6.  emploj'ment,  or  whose  work  commands  inadequate  wages.     The 

7.  business  bear  lightly  upon  these,  even  while  their  less  competent 

8.  fellows  are  reduced  to  actual  want.     A  reduction  of  force 

9.  means  always  the  discharge  of  the  least  efficient  hands,  and 
10.  a  reduction  of  wages  strikes  them  first  also.     u  There  is 


HOW   TO   MAKE   A   LIVING. 


1.  roi mi  enough  in  the  upper  stories,"  said  Mr.  Webster,  when 

•;.  lie  \vas  reminded  that  the  profession  he  had  chosen  was 

.!.  already  overcrowded,  and  the  remark  holds  good  in  all  other 

4.  avocations.     To  sum  up  briefly  what  has  gone  before,  we 

6.  >ay  to  every  young  man:  first,  select  a  calling  for  [second, 

i1'.  which  you  are  fitted  by  nature,  education  and  circumstances; 

v.  learn  your  business  thoroughly,  making  yourself  a  master  work- 

[man;  third, 

8.  entertain  no  thought  of  changing  from  one  avocation  to  another; 

it.  fourth,  bring  to  bear  upon  your  work  all  the  energy  [membering 

in.  and  capacity  you  have ;  fifth,  do  your  work  conscientiously,  re- 

1.  that  to  do  it  ill  is  to  defraud  yourself,  your 

•2.  family  and  the  world;  sixth,  respect  yourself  too  much  to 

3.  hold  your  calling  unworthy,  bearing  in  mind  the  fact  that 

4.  that  work  is  most  honorable  which  is  best  done. 


CHAPTER   IV. 

MARRIAGE   AND   MONEY. 

1.  Can  a  young  man  afford  to  marry;     It  is  unquestionably 

2.  true  that  no  man  should  marry  who  is  not  able 

'•).  to  support  a  family  in  tolerable  comfort.     But  every  man 
4.   who  knows  a  business  thoroughly,  and  has  reasonably  good  health, 
">.  is  able,  in  our  country  at  least,  to  support  a 
f..  family,  if  he  be  right  minded  and  master  of  himself. 
; .    Without  skill  in  some  recognized  calling,  however,  marriage  is  in 
8.  the  last  degree  dangerous,  even  to  men  with  wealth  already 
0.  in  possession.     There  is  no  certainty  that  one's  wealth  will 
10.  remain  with  him.     Skill  is  the  only  certain  possession,  the 


MARRIAGE  AND  MONEY.  31 


1.  only  thing  which  one  cannot  lose,  and  skill  only  is  [has 

2.  an  adequate  safeguard  against  ultimate  poverty.     The  man  who 

3.  skill  to  offer  the  world  is  sure  of  a  market 

4.  for  his  wares,  and  such  a  man  need  have  no  [such  a 

5.  hesitation  about  marrying  under  proper  conditions.      And    to 

6.  man  a  family  has  a  positive  pecuniary  value,  much  greater 

7.  than  the  cost  of  its  maintenance.     The  man  of  family 

8.  has  incentives,  which  no  unmarried  man  can  have,  to  constant 

0.  exertion,  to  sobriety  of  life,  to  economy,  to  steadiness  of 

10.  purpose,  to  all  those  virtues,  in  short,  which  render  business 

1.  success  certain  and  make  business  failure  next  to  impossible. 

2.  men  as  a  rule,  are  better  workmen  than  single  ones,        [Married 

3.  in  every  branch  of  human  exertion.     They  retain  their  situations 

4.  longer.     Their  attention  is  less  likely  to  be  diverted  from 

5.  business  to  other  things.     Their  earnings,  in  every  kind  of 

6.  business,  are  usually  greater  than  those  of  unmarried  men ;  and 

7.  their  hold  upon  business  is  far  surer  than  that  of 

8.  men  who  have  only  themselves  to  provide  for.     Against  ah1 

9.  these  considerations  must  be  set  the  cost  of  maintaining  a 
10.  family.     But  is  there  really  any  cost  in  the  matter? 

1.  Is  there  not  rather  a  positive  economy  in  marriage?     As 

2.  a  rule,  certain!}*,  married  men  save  more  money  than  single 

3.  men.     They  are  not  married  men  because  they  are  better 

4.  off  than  their  fellows,  but  are  better  off  because  they 

5.  are  married  men.     The  unmarried  man  has  a  hundred  necessary 

6.  expenses,  which  the  married  man  escapes  entirely.     And  the 

[temptations 

7.  which  beset  single  men  to  spend  money  in  unnecessary  ways, — 

8.  temptations  of  which  the  married  man  knows  nothing, — are  too 

9.  well  known  to  need  mention.     And  the  money  thus  unnecessarily 
10.  spent  is  commonly  sufficient  to  pay  the  entire  expense  of 


!}•>  HOW  TO   MAKE  A   LIVING. 

1.  a  family.     The  fact  is  that  very  few  single  men 

2.  who  must  live  from  their  work  save  anything  at  all 

3.  out  of  their  incomes,  while  nearly  all  married  ones  do. 

4.  In  other  words,  the  majority  of  men  find  it  more 

5.  expensive  to  live  single  than  to  marry.     *!"  Aside  from  the 

ti.  moral  enormity  involved,  the  very  worst  speculation  in  which  any 

7.  man  can  engage  is  that  of  marrying  for  money.     Judged 

8.  by  purely  economic  laws,  it  is  almost  always  dangerous,  to 

9.  say  the  least.     Young  women  who  inherit  property  are  usually 
10.  the  daughters  of  wealthy  men,  and  at  any  rate  are 

1.  accustomed  to  live  in  a  style  which  the  money  or 

2.  property  they  bring  into  the  partnership  will  not  suffice  to 

3.  maintain.     In  other  words,  the  expense  of  maintaining  such  a 

4.  wife  is  usually  greater  than  the  income  her  property  can 

5.  be  made  to  yield,  and,  as  a  consequence,  mercenary  marriages 

6.  of  this  kind  are  apt  to  result  in  an  ultimate 

7.  poverty  which  the  wife  does  not  know  how  to  share 

8.  with  her  husband,  or  how  to  remedy  in  the  smallest 

9.  degree.     And  the  principle  holds  good  in  cases  in  which 
10.  the  marriage  has  not  been  a  mercenary  one  at  all, 

1.  if  the  wife  alone  has  brought  money  or  property  into 

2.  the  family.     With  the  very  best  of  purposes  she  does 

3.  not  know  how  to  adapt  herself  to  a  mode  of 

4.  life  less  expensive  than  that  which  obtained  in  her  father's 

5.  house,  and  her  inheritance  alone  is  rarely  ever  sufficient  for 

6.  that.     1"  We  hear  a  good  deal  of  the  extravagance  of 

7.  women,  and  of  the  ruin  it  works  in  men's  affairs. 

8.  Somebody  once  said  that  modern  women  are  so  extravagant  in 

9.  dress,  and  so  helpless  in  other  respects,  that  none  but 
10.  rich  men  can  afford  to  marry  them,  and  foolish  people 


MARRIAGE  AND  MONEY.  33 


1.  have  been  saying  the  same  thing,  or  something  like  it, 

2.  ever  since.     Every  time  a  man  fails  in  business,  people 

3.  take  an  inventory  of  his  wife's  wardrobe,  and  cry  out, 

4.  "  Poor  fellow,  he  was  ruined  by  her  extravagance !"     No  account 

5.  is  taken  of  his  club  expenses,  or  his  unnecessary  restaurant 
G.  bills,  or  his  fast  horses,  or  the  vanity  that  prompted 

7.  him  to  buy  a  finer  house  than  he  needed,  and 

8.  to  furnish  it  in  a  style  which  he  could  not 

0.  afford.     The  man  may  have  gambled  his  money  away,  or 
10.  he  may  have  lost  it  in  reckless  stock  speculation  for 

1.  all  anybody  knows  to  the  contrary,  while  his  wife,  whom 

2.  he  has  deluded  into  the  belief  that  he  is  rich, 

3.  has  dressed  and  lived  only  as  his  seeming  circumstances  justified 

4.  her  in  doing,  doing  it  too  for  his  sake,  chiefly, 

5.  that  he  might  not  be  ashamed  to  introduce  her  as 

G.  his  wife, — that  his  home  might  be  pleasant, — that  he 

7.  might  feel  free  to  have  his  friends  as  guests,  and 

8.  sometimes  for  the  sake  of  the  business  advantages  resulting  from 

9.  a  graceful  hospitality.     It  is  true  enough  that  women  are 
10.  not  commonly  taught  the  value  of  money  or  the  principles 

1 .  of  economy  as  they  should  be ;  but  for  the  most 

2.  part  they  are  not  fools.     The  ruin  of  their  husbands 

3.  is  their  ruin  also.     Poverty  and  changed  circumstances  fall  far 

4.  more  heavily  on  them  than  upon  their  partners  in  life. 

5.  The  man  goes  to  his  business  and  spends  half  his 

6.  life  outside  his  home.     The  woman  lives  at  home,  and 

7.  suffers.     To  her  poverty  is  ever  present.     It  is  she 

8.  who  must  pinch  and  save  in  ungraceful  ways.     Of  the 

9.  burden  of  the  ruin  she  must  bear  the  larger. share. 

10.  And  knowing  all  this,  women  do  not  willingly  work  ruin 
3 


34  HOW  TO  MAKE  A  LIVING. 


1.  in  their  husband's  affairs.     That  they  bring  it  about  sometimes 

2.  is  true  enough,  but  they  do  so  unwittingly  in  nearly 

3.  all  cases,  and  it  is  clearly  the  fault  of  the 

4.  man  that  they  know  not  what  they  do.     A  man 

5.  spends  money  in  a  hundred  ways  of  which  his  neighbors 

6.  know  nothing,  while  the  extravagance  of  a  woman  is  almost 

7.  certain  to  be  ostentatious.     Indulgence  is  his  object,  display  hers, 

8.  and  so  his  sins  are  covered  while  hers  advertise  themselves. 

9.  And  even  that  which  seems  to  be  her  extravagance  is 
10.  often  his.     The  new  carpet  may  have  been  bought  at 

1.  his  behest,  that  he  might  seem  prosperous  in  the  eyes 

2.  of  his  friends  and  guests,  but  the  wife  is  blamed 

3.  if  a  catastrophe  happens  to  reveal  the  fact  that  the 

4.  purchase  was  an  unwise  one.     Every  married  woman  knows  that 

5.  she  may  be  left  a  widow,  with  children  to  maintain, 

6.  and  nearly  every  married  womr.n  is  anxious  to  prepare  for 

7.  such  a  contingencjT  by  the  accumulation  of  means  while  the 

8.  means  are  to  be  had.     But  every  woman  also  wants 

9.  to  live  as  comfortably  as  she  can.     If  she  be 

10.  right-minded  she  desires  to  make  her  home  a  specially  attractive 

1.  place,  not  for  her  own  sake  only  nor  even  chiefly, 

2.  but  for  the  sake  of  her  family.     To  reconcile  these 

3.  two  desires  with  each  other — to  accomplish  the  one  end 

4.  with  the  least  possible  sacrifice  of  the  other,  is  the 

5.  problem  which  every  married  woman  has  to  solve,  and  most 

6.  of  them  honestly  and  earnestly  endeavor  to  solve  it  satisfactorily. 

7.  Women  are  neither  idiots  nor  children.     They  may  not  know 

8.  much  of  the  laws  of  finance,  but  they  do  know 

9.  that  if  they  spend  more  money  than  their  husbands  make, 
10.  the  end  will  be  financial  ruin.     But  what  is  a 


MARRIAGE  AND  MONEY.  35 

1.  woman  to  do,  who  is  vaguely  told  that  she  must 

2.  economize,  but  is  at  the  same  time  left  in  ignorance 

3.  of  the  amount  of  money  she  may  legitimately  spend?     To 

4.  tell  the  wife  to  economize,  without  telling  her  also  what 

5.  her  husband's  income  is,  is  to  talk  to  her  in 

(').  a  language  of  which  she  does  not  know  the  alphabet. 

7.  And  when  to  such  folly  is  added  the  injustice  of 

8.  misleading  her  as  to  the  extent  of  your  resources  by 

'.).  your  own  self-indulgence,  or  even  by  indulgence  shown  to  her, 
10.  she  is  certainly  not  to  blame  if  her  conception  of 

1 .  the  economy  necessary  shall  prove  wholly  inadequate.     No  sane 

[man 

2.  would  think  of  entrusting  the  management  of  an  important  branch 

3.  of  his  business  to  a  partner,  and  keeping  that  partner 

4.  in  ignorance  of  the  facts  underlying  the  business  itself,  even 

5.  if  he  could  find  a  partner  willing  to  be  kept 

G.  in  such  ignorance.     In  an  important  sense  every  wife  is 

7.  her  husband's  business  partner.     She  not  only  keeps  the  expense 

8.  account,  but  governs  it  also,  and  she  can  govern  it 

i».  wisely  only  when  she  knows  upon  what  it  rests.     Having 
10.  a  duty  to  do  in  the  matter,  she  has  a 

1.  right   to  the   information   necessary  to  its   proper  perform- 

2.  while  it  is  the  right  of  the  wife  to  share  [ance.     1[  And 

3.  in  her  husband's  business  sufficiently  at  least  to  be  able 

4.  to  manage  it  wisely  and  well,  it  is  clearly  the 

5.  interest  of  the  husband  to  make  her  his  advisory  partner 

6.  to  a  much  greater  extent  if  possible.     The  duties  and 

7.  responsibilities  implied  in  such  a  position  give  healthful  occupa- 

8.  her  mind  for  one  thing.     The  wife  who  is  fully  [tion  to 

9.  informed  of  her  husband's  business  affairs ;  who  knows  what  his 
10.  means  and  what  his  necessities  are;  who  is  able  to 


36  HOW  TO  MAKE  A  LIVING. 

1.  decide  for  herself  what  measure  of  economy  is  prudent,  will 

2.  naturally  plan  and  execute  a  system  of  saving  which  will 

3.  accomplish  its  purpose  with  the  least  possible  friction,  and  with 

4.  the  smallest  sacrifice  of  comfort  to  her  family.     Such  a 

5.  woman  has  many  incentives  to  economy  which  her  less  fully 

6.  enlightened  sister  can  never  have.     She  is  constantly  able  to 

7.  adjust  the  family  expenses  to  the  family  purse,  and  as 

8.  she  guesses  at  nothing,  she  is  not  likely  to  make 

9.  serious  mistakes.     Above  all,  she  becomes  as  much  interested  as 
10.  he  in  the  success  of  a  business  upon  which  both 

1.  depend  for  prosperity,  and  of  the  progress  of  which  she 

2.  is  fully  informed,  and  there  are  a  thousand  ways  in 

:!.  which  she  may  and  will  contribute  materially  to  its  successful 

4.  prosecution.     She  is  an  excellent  adviser  in  many  cases,  and 

5.  a  conservative  force  always,  and  every  business  man  knows  how 

6.  sorely  conservatism  is  needed  in  most  men's  affairs.     When  the 

7.  business  becomes  less  profitable  than  usual,  the  well-informed 

[wife  sees 

8.  the  necessity  for  domestic  retrenchment,  long  before  most  men 
(.i.  think  it  necessary.     In  short,  the  young  man  with  his       [would 

10.  way  to  make  in  the  world  cannot  do  a  better 

1.  thing  than  take  his  wife  into  confidential  partnership  from  the 

2.  beginning.     When  two  people  marry  it  is  presumable  that  they 

3.  intend  to  be  as  prosperous  and  happy  as  possible.     Their 

4.  interests  are  identical.     Upon  the  wise  administration  of  their 

5.  both  at  home  and  in  business,  depends,  in  a  large  [affairs 

6.  measure,  the  success  of  their  efforts  to  live  happily.     Knowing 

7.  this,  common  sense  ought  to  teach  them  the  necessity  of 

8.  a  clear  understanding  at  the  very  outset.     They  must  work 

9.  together  with  common  means  for  the  accomplishment  of  a  common 
10.  end,  and  there  can  be  nothing  more  absurd  than  an 


HOW  TO   LIVE   ON  YOUR   INCOME.  37 

1.  attempt  to  do  this  while  one  of  the  joint  managers — 

2.  and  that  the  one  upon  whom  chiefly  falls  the  duty 

3.  of  maintaining  a  just  ratio  between  expenses  and  income, — is 

4.  kept  ignorant  of  the  state  of  the  family  exchequer.     It 

5.  seems  strange  that  any  man  should  be  ashamed  of  his 
C.  lack  of  wealth;  and  that  he  should  blush  to  own 

7.  it  to  his  wife  is  even  stranger.     The  only  sensible 

8.  course— the  only  course  indeed — in  which  there  is  even 

9.  tolerable  safety,  is  for  the  man  who  provides  the  means 

10.  to  enlighten  the  woman  who  controls  the  expenditures  as  to 


L  the  exact  resources  at  their  joint  command. 


CHAPTER  V. 

HOW   TO   LIVE  ON  YOUR  INCOME. 

1.  There  was  a  deal  of  wisdom  in  Mr.  Micawber's  dictum 

2.  that  if  a  man  has  twenty  pounds  a  year  for 

3.  his  income  and  spends  nineteen  pounds  nineteen  shillings  and 

4.  he  will  be  happy,  but  that  if  he  spends  twenty  [sixpence 

5.  pounds  one,  he  will  be  miserable.     We  all  recognize  the 

6.  truth  of  this  as  heartily  as  Mr.  Micawber  did, — and 

7.  a  good  many  of  us  imitate  his  utter  neglect  to 

8.  practise  the  precept  which  he  was  so  fond  of  laying 
f>.  down  for  the  guidance  of  others.     We  have  need  of 

10.  very  little  arithmetic  to  teach  us  that  if  we  spend 

452268 


38  HOW  TO  MAKE  A  LIVING. 

1.  more  money  than  we  get  we  shall  be  ruined.     I 

2.  happen  to  know  a  man  whose  actual  income  during  the 

3.  past  ten  or  twelve  years  has  never  been  less  than 

4.  four  thousand  dollars,  and  yet  he  has  gone  deeper  and 

5.  deeper  into  debt  with  each  succeeding  year,  simply  because  each 
•i.  year  has  brought  with  it  the  hope  that  the  next 

7.  would  prove  greatly  more  profitable  than  any  of  its  predecessors. 

8.  He  has  never  once  relinquished  his  purpose  to  accumulate  a 

9.  moderate  sum  of  profitably  invested  money,  upon  which  to  retire 
10.  from  active  business,  and  that  he  might  have  done  so 

1 .  before  this  time  is  evident,  if  he  had  been  content 

'2.  to  govern  each  year's  expenditures  by  the  year's  earnings,  rather 

:}.  than  by  next  year's  promise.     His  case  is  an  extreme 

4.  one,  perhaps,  but  the  principle  involved  is  very  common.    Almost 

5.  every  man  who  lives  beyond  his  means  intends  to  live 
»'..  within  them.     His  failure  to  do  so  is  due  in 

7.  most  cases  to  self-delusion  of  some  sort,  and  rarely  if 

8.  ever  to  a  deliberate  purpose  or  even  to  a  conscious 

9.  recklessness  of  the  consequences  of  this  self-delusion.     *  You 
10.  ascertain  what  your  income  is ;  not  what  it  is  to  [must  first 

1.  be;  still  less  what  you  hope  it  may  be,  but 

2.  what  it  is.     There  must  be  no  uncertainty  of  any 

3.  sort  about  the  matter.     Vague  ideas,  approximate  estimates,  are 

4.  in  all  business  matters.     The  merchant  is  not  content  to      [fatal 

5.  know  the  details  of  his  business  approximately.     He  takes  care 
(I.  to  learn  the  exact  amount  of  his  expenses,  the  exact 

7.  cost  of  goods,  the  exact  extent  of  his  sales,  and 

8.  exactitude  is  certainly  not  less  essential  in  dealing  with  the 

9.  problem  of  how  to  keep  one's  expenditures  within  one's  means. 
10.  But  even  this  is  not  all.     You  must  not  only 


HOW  TO   LIVE   ON   YOUR  INCOME.  39 

1.  know  what  your  income  is,  but  also  what  you  can 

2.  certainly  keep  it  in  the  future.     A  salary  which  may 

3.  be  reduced  or  cut  off  entirely  next  week,  or  next 

4.  month,  or  next  year,  is  no  safe  measure  of  your 

5.  ability  to  spend.     To  a  certain  degree  your  income,  whatever 
(i.  its  nature  and  its  source  may  be,  must  be  the 

7.  measure  of  your  expenses,  but  if  its  continuance  be  uncertain 

8.  you  cannot  wisely  expend  as  large  a  share  of  it 

9.  as  you  might  of  an  equal  income  of  a  more 

10.  certainly  permanent  sort.    Possible  periods  of  reduced  earnings  or 

[of 

1.  no  earnings  at  all  must  be  admitted  as  factors  in 

2.  the  problem,  and  it  is  the  average  to  which  these 

3.  may  reduce  your  earnings  that  should  be  your  standard.     If 

4.  you  can  keep  within  that  average  you  are  safe,  but 

5.  not  otherwise.     Should  your  precautions  prove  in  the  end  to 

6.  have  been  unnecessary,  the  only  result  will  be  a  larger   [f  Having 

7.  sum   saved   and   a  speedier  accomplishment  of  your   purpose. 

8.  ascertained  what  amount  of  money  you  can  certainly  count  upon 

9.  as  your  income,  it  will  be  comparatively  easy  to  keep 

10.  your  expenditures  within  that  limit.     You  will  know  at  any 

1.  rate  how  much  you  can  afford  to  spend,  and  as 

2.  over-expenditure  results  in  a  great  degree  from  lack  of  precisely 

3.  this  knowledge,  you  will  at  least  be  much  safer  with 

4.  than  without  it.     You  will  know  what  is  the  nineteen 

5.  pounds  nineteen  shillings  and  sixpence  which  you  may  spend  with 

6.  safety.     But  as  next  week  or  next  month  may  bring    [safety  lies 

7.  an  unforeseen  necessity  for  extraordinary  expense,  your  only 

8.  in  providing  in  advance  for  such  contingencies.     It  is  never 

9.  safe  to  trust  to  future  economy  to  repair  the  waste 

10.  and  restore  the  disturbed  equilibrium.     If  you  find  thirty  dollars 


40  HOW  TO  MAKE  A  LIVING. 

1.  a  week  to  be  the  amount  you  can  afford  to 

2.  spend  throughout  the  year,  it  is  the  part  of  prudence 

3.  to  spend  only  twenty-five  now,  so  that  when  sickness  or 

4.  other  accident  shall  compel  you  to  exceed  the  amount  for 

5.  a  time,  your  safe  average  may  not  be  transcended  in 

0.  the  end.     Neglect  to  do  this  has  made  saving  impossible 

7.  to  hundreds  of  people,  and  we  hear  every  day  of 

8.  families  reduced  to  starvation  by  reason  of  some  unexpected  and 

9.  unprovided-for  sickness,  on  the  part  of  the  producing  member. 
10.  once  knew  a  man  whose  rule  in  life  it  was  |  •  I 

1.  to  spend  all  the  money  he  could  get  and  to 

2.  stretch  his  credit  also  to  its  utmost  limit,  and  he 

3.  justified  this  on  the  ground  that  unexpended  money  and  unused 

4.  credit  were  of  no  account  in  the  sum  of  life's 

5.  enjoyments.     But  this  is  an  exceptional  case.     Most  people  dis- 

6.  intend  to  save  something  out  of  their  incomes,  but  they     [tinctly 

7.  fail  because  they  do  not  know  when  to  save.     They 

8.  intend  to  save  largely  as  soon  as  the  immediate  pressure 

9.  of  present  wants  shall  be  relieved.     Next  week,  next  month, 
10.  they  will  certainly  save,  but  just  now  it  is  impossible. 

1.  On  nothing  else  do  so  man}*  slip.     The  trouble  is 

2.  that  it  always  seems  easier  to  economize  after  a  while 

3.  than  now.     Next  week's  necessities  do  not  assert  themselves  as 

4.  those  of  the  present  do.     We  do  not  discover  all 

5.  of  them  in  advance,  and  those  which  we  do  see 

6.  seem  far  less  pressing  than  they  will  when  we  shall 

7.  come  to  them.     And  so  we  exaggerate  our  ability  to 

8.  save  hereafter,  while  we  neglect  to  save  now,  at  the 

9.  same  time  cultivating  a  fatal  habit  of  self-indulgence  which  is 
10.  likely  to  prove  one  of  the  greatest  difficulties  in  our 


HOW  TO  LIVE  ON  YOUR  INCOME.  41 


1.  way.     There  is  just  one  time  to  economize,  and  that 

2.  is  Now.     You  must  save  something  to-day  and  every  day, 

3.  never  offsetting  to-day's  neglect  with  to-morrow's  possible  per- 

formance.    To 

4.  save  requires  deliberate  self-denial.     He   who   puts  away  any 

5.  of  his  income  must  of  necessity  deny  himself  an  exactly    [portion 

6.  equivalent  portion  of  the  things  which  that  income  is  capable 

7.  of  buying,  and  there  are  few  people  indeed  whose  incomes 

8.  are  so  large  that  this  may  be  done  without  a 

9.  direct  and  earnest  effort.     1  A  very  common  trouble  in  this 
10.  matter  of  putting  away  one's  earnings  for  future  use  is 

1.  the  failure  to  appreciate  the  value  of  small  things,  or 

2.  rather  the  failure  to  appreciate  the  saving  worth,  if  I 

3.  may  so  put  it,  of  the  very  smallness  and  valuelessness 

4.  of  little  things.     In  other  words,  we  are  apt  to 

5.  regard  the  pennies  or  dimes  in  our  pockets  as  too 

6.  small  to  be  worth  saving.     We  intend  to  save,  but 

7.  rarely  ever  find  it  convenient  to  spare  a  five  or 

8.  ten  dollar  bank  note  from  our  pocket-books,  and  deeming  smaller 

9.  savings  hardly  worth  attention,  we  end  by  putting  away  nothing 
10.  because  we  cannot  put  away  a  good  deal.     All  the 

1.  saving  that  is  done  at  all  is  done  in  small 

2.  sums.     The  deposits  in  savings  banks  amount  to  many  millions, 

3.  but  they  consist  almost  wholly  of  very  little  sums  of 

4.  money;  and  so  well  is  this  principle  recognized  in  institutions 

5.  of  that  sort  that  they  all  make  it  a  rule 

6.  not  only  to  accept  but  especially  to  encourage  small  deposits, 

7.  many  of  them  taking  as  little  as  a  single  dime, 

8.  willingh',  in  spite  of  the  fact  that  every  deposit  makes 

9.  necessary  an  amount  of  clerical  work  which  the  dime  would 
10.  hardly  pay  for,  even  if  it  were  given  to  the 


42  HOW  TO  MAKE  A  LIVING. 


1 .  institution  outright.     As  a  rule,  therefore,  the  place  to  begin 

2.  saving  is  in  little  things.     The  pennies  which  lie  loose 

3.  in  one's  pockets  should  be  the  first  objects  of  attention, 

4.  and  after  these,  fractional  currency  must  be  considered.     No  one 

5.  ever  realizes,  until  he  has  subjected  the  matter  to  the 

6.  test  of  experiment,  how  much  money  passes  through  his  hands 

7.  annually  in  very  small  pieces.     I  happened  to  be  present 

8.  one  day  when  a  man  of  very  limited  means  was 

9.  discussing  the  possibility,  for  he  was  in  no  doubt  whatever 
10.  as  to  the  desirability,  of  insuring  his  life.     He  urged 

1.  the  fact  that  with  all  the  economy  he  knew  how 

2.  to  practise  he  never  yet  had  been  able  to  count 

3.  fifty  dollars  as  spare  money ;  and  he  insisted  that  it 

4.  required  absolutely  all  the  money  he  could  make  in  his 

5.  business  to  meet  the  actual  wants  of  his  family,  and 

6.  without  doubt  he  had  alwajTs  found  it  so.     The  agent 

7.  replied,  however,  with  a  remark  that  startled  him :  "  A  policy 

8.  of  five  thousand  dollars  will  only  cost  you  ten  cents, 

9.  and  you  can  save  that  by  wearing  your  boots  a 

10.  week  longer  than  you  commonly  do."     "Ten  cents?     What  do 

1.  you  mean?     The  premium  according  to  your  own  statement  is 

2.  a  hundred  and  nine  dollars  a  year."     "  That  is  very 

3.  true,"  replied  the  agent,  "and  yet  you  will  only  have 

4.  to  save  ten  cents,  or  at  any  rate  you  need 

5.  never  be  conscious  of  saving  more  than  that,  to  meet 

(I.  the  payments.     I'll  explain  what  I  mean.     Take  a  child's 

7.  safe, — it  will  cost  you  only  ten  cents,  and  whenever 

8.  a  ten-cent  piece  comes  to  you  in  making  change,  slip 

9.  it  into  the  safe.     If  two  or  three  come  at 

10.  once  and  from  the  same  person,  put  only  one  in. 


HOW  TO   LIVE  ON   YOUR  INCOME.  43 


1.  I'll  advance  the  first  payment  myself,  and  when  the  second 

2.  falls  due,  we'll  open  the  safe.     If  there  isn't  enough 

3.  in  it  to  pay  me  back,  after  paying  the  second 

4.  year's  premium,  I'll  stand  the  loss.     And  if  you  miss 

5.  the  money  so  put  away,  you  needn't  continue  the  policy." 

6.  The  proposition  was  both  novel  and  startling,  and  in  accepting 

7.  it  the  man,  who  was  a  merchant  in  a  country 

8.  place,  warned  his  friend  that  he  should  hold  him  to 

9.  his  promise.     A  year  later  I  went  with  the  agent 
10.  to  see  the  safe  opened.     Instead  of  one  there  were 

1.  several  of  the  little  tin  receptacles,  each  full  of  ten-cent 

2.  pieces,  but  the  merchant  was  confident  that  the  aggregate  could 

3.  not  be  more  than  fifty  dollars.     "  But  it  is  fifty 

4.  dollars  saved,"  he  said,  "for  truly  I  haven't  missed  it 

5.  anywhere."     When  the  boxes  were  opened  they  were  found  to 

6.  contain  two  hundred  and  eighty-seven  dollars  and  forty  cents, — 

[considerably 

7.  more  than  enough  to  pay  the  two  annual  premiums.     The 

8.  anecdote  is  a  homely  one,  but  it  serves  to  point 

9.  a  moral.     It  shows  the  value  of  small  sums,  and       [cally  saved. 
10.  their  capacity  to  make  a  considerable  aggregate  when  systemati- 

1.  ^i  As  small  sums  are  more  easily  and  more  surely  saved 
'2.  than  large  ones,  so,  on  the  other  hand,  it  is 

3.  in  small  things  that  we  may,  with  the  least  effort, 

4.  practise  economy.     Everybody  wonders,  now  and  then,  where  all 

5.  money  goes,  but  not  one  man  in  a  hundred  satisfies  [his 

6.  himself  on  the  subject.     Not  one  man  in  a  hundred 

7.  indulges  unnecessarily  in  things  which  must  be  paid  for  in 

8.  a  lump.     When  called  upon  to  pay  out  a  sum 

9.  of  money  which  is  considerable,  if  measured  by  the  standard 
10.  of  our  ability  to  pay,  we  are  sure  to  scrutinize 


44  HOW  TO  MAKE  A  LIVING. 


1.  pretty  sharply  the  desirableness  of  the  thing  paid  for  and 

2.  our  ability  to  do  without  it.     In  short,  we  are 

3.  not  apt  to  be  extravagant  in  large  matters,  and  in 

4.  point  of  fact  there  is  very  little  room  for  economy 

5.  in  such  things,  in  most  men's  affairs.     It  is  the 

G.  little  things  that  we  buy  thoughtlessly  in  which  we  are 

7.  extravagant,  and  it  is  these  things  which  we  may  do 

8.  without,  either  in  whole  or  in  part  without  serious  inconvenience. 

9.  It  is  by  cutting  off  expenditure  for  these  that  we 
10.  may  save,  and  the  aggregate  of  the  cost  of  these 

[with 

1.  is  always  much  greater  than  their  purchaser  imagines,  especialty 

2.  people  who  live  in  cities.     An  intelligent,  thrifty  mechanic  once 

3.  told  me  that  he  had  bought  and  paid  for  a  [in 

4.  comfortable  home,  merely  by  reducing  his  own  personal  expenses 

5.  three  particulars.     He  blacked  his  own  boots,  walked  to  and 

6.  from  his  work  instead  of  riding  in  the  street  cars, 

7.  and  brought  his  lunch  from  home  instead  of  taking  it 

8.  at  a  restaurant.     His  saving  amounted  to  about  fifty  cents 

9.  a  day — a  mere  trifle — but  in  ten  or  twelve 

10.  years  it  enabled  him  to  buy  a  good  home  without 

1.  denying  himself  any  real  comfort,  and  without  imposing  any 

2.  whatever  on  hisfamily.     He  had  been  able  to  see  [burden 

3.  no  other  place  of  saving,  and  probably  there  was  no 

4.  other  in  his  case;  but  most  of  us  have  a 

5.  variety  of  expenses  which  might  as  well  be  stopped  as 

6.  continued,  and  so  most  of  us  may  do  a  good 

7.  deal  more  than  he  did  by  the  judicious  application  of 

8.  an  economic  pruning-knife.    And  there  is  still  another  reason  why 

9.  it  is  easier  to  save  in  small  things  than  in 

10.  matters  of  more  importance.     It  is  much  easier  to  deny 


HOW  TO  LIVE  ON  YOUR   INCOME.  45 


1.  ourselves  small  comforts   and  small  luxuries  than  large  ones. 

2.  is  a  magnified  desirability  in  large  things  which  it  is          [There 

3.  difficult  to  resist,  but  he  must  be  very  weak,  indeed, 

4.  who  cannot  deny  himself  little  comforts  and  luxuries  of  temporary 

5.  importance  only,  or  of  no  importance  at  all,  for  the 

6.  sake  of  permanently  bettering  his  financial  condition.     •"  There 

7.  the  reach  of  nearly  all  a  simple  and  easy  way  [is  within 

8.  of  saving  about  one-third  the  cost  of  all  family  supplies — 

9.  namely,  by  buying  everything  at  wholesale.    It  is  very  convenient 
10.  to  give  daily  orders  at  the  grocer's  for  such  things 

1.  as  are  immediately  needed,  knowing  that  they  will  be  promptly 

2.  delivered  at  one's  residence,  but  the  convenience  is  one  for 

3.  which  purchasers  must  pay  a  round  price.     The  grocer  does 

4.  not  pay  rent  and  keep  a  horse  and  a  man 

5.  "  merely  for  the  fun  of  the  thing,"  as  I  once 

6.  heard  a  business  man  phrase  it,  and  it  is  a 

7.  pleasant  little  fiction  that  he  delivers  goods  "  in  any  part 

8.  of  the  city,  free  of  charge. "     He  does  nothing  of 

9.  the  sort,  for  the  simple  reason  that  he  has  no 
10.  interest  in  doing  it,  and  cannot  afford  to  do  it. 

1.  He  makes  no  specific  charge  for  delivering  goods,  it  is 

2.  true,  but  he  charges  for  it  nevertheless,  adding  the  amount 

3.  to  his  prices.     There  is  veiy  little  profit,  we  are 

4.  told,  in  keeping  a  retail  grocery,  and  the  statement  is 

5.  doubtless  true,  and  yet  any  one  may  satisfy  himself  by 

6.  experiment  that  he  can  buy  his  groceries  at  wholesale  for 

7.  at  least  one-third  less  than  the  retailer  charges  him,  provided 

8.  he  buys  a  stock  of  several  articles  at  once.     Sometimes 

9.  the  saving  is  considerably  greater  even  than  this,  but  this 
10.  much  is  certain  in  any  case,  and  such  a  saving 


46  HOW  TO  MAKE  A  LIVING. 


1.  makes  a  very  pleasant  little  account  to  contemplate  in  a 

2.  savings  bank,  at  semi-annually  compounding  interest.     The  sav- 

[ing  of  the 
:!.  difference  between  wholesale  and  retail  prices  is  not  the  only 

4.  advantage  gained  by  any  means.     One  scrutinizes  the  want  he 

5.  is  providing  for,  if  it  must  be  paid  for  in 

G.  considerable  sums,  as  he  does  not  where  its  cost  is 

7.  met  by  the  daily  expenditure  of  small  amounts,  and  when 

8.  one  buys  supplies  at  wholesale  he  realizes  the  necessity  of 

9.  using  them  judiciously,  as  he  never  can  in  any  other 
10.  case.     Again,  when  the  supplies  are  to  be  bought  the 

1.-  money  must  be  provided,  and  to  provide  it  one  must 

2.  often  economize  closely  in  other  ways,  which  is  of  itself 

3.  an  advantage.     The  people  who  do  not  buy  at  wholesale 

4.  are  very  often  the  people  who  can  least  afford  to 

5.  purchase  otherwise.     They  buy  at  retail  because  they  never  have 

6.  money  enough  in  hand  to  make  a  wholesale  purchase  possible, 

7.  and  if  they  could  be  persuaded  to  change  their  habit, 

8.  the  effort  to  save  something  for  the  purpose  would  teach 

9.  them  the  lesson  they  most  need — namely,  how  to  economize. 
10.  *[  You  cannot  afford,  if  you  have  need  to  save  anything, 

1.  to  keep  an  open  account  with  your  butcher,  your  baker, 

2.  or  anybody  else.     In  the  first  place,  money  is  always 

3.  worth  interest,  and  no  tradesman  has  enough  of  it  to 

4.  enable  him  to  let  it  out  for  nothing,  else  he 

5.  would  not  be  a  tradesman  at  all.     He  who  buys 

6.  his  goods  on  credit,  therefore,  must,  in  one  way  or 

7.  another,  pay  for  the  indulgence.     He  has  the  use  of 

8.  another  man's  money  and  must  pay  interest  on  it.     And 

9.  this  he  does,  whether  the  item  appears  in  his  weekly, 

10.  or  monthly,  or  quarterly  bill,  or  not.     Interest  is  charged 


HOW  TO  LIVE   ON   YOUR  INCOME.  47 


1.  in  every  case,  even  though  the  tradesman  himself  be  unconscious 

2.  of  the  fact,  as  he  very  often  is.     His  experience 

3.  has  taught  him  what  percentage  he  must  add  to  the 

4.  cost  of  his  goods  to  make  a  living  profit,  and  [outstanding 

5.  in  determining  this,  experience  has  duly  included  interest  upon 

6.  bills.     Another  reason  for  avoiding  bills  is  found  in  the 

7.  fact  that  you  are  well-nigh  certain  to  buy  a  good 

8.  deal  more  when  you  buy  upon  credit  than  when  you 

9.  pay  cash.     The  tradesmen  all  know  this,  and  it  is 

10.  for  precisely  this  reason  that  they  take  the  risk  incident 

1.  to  time  sales.     The  extra  purchases  which  customers  buying  upon 

2.  credit  are  sure  to  make,  constitute  the  inducement  to  that 

3.  mode  of  doing  business.     When  you  must  pay  for  everything 

4.  you  buy  at  the  time  of  buying,  you  scrutinize  the 

5.  wants  to  be  supplied  much  more  sharply  than  your  neighbor 

6.  who  purchases  upon  credit  is  apt  to  do.     The  amount 

7.  of  cash  you  have — if  you  owe  nothing — is  an 

8.  exact  measure  of  your  ability  to  purchase;  and  as  the 

9.  whole  science  of  economy  and  thrift  consists  of  buying  somewhat 
10.  less  than  you  can  afford,  it  will  be  seen  at 

1.  a  glance  that  even  without  the  other  considerations  urged  this 

2.  one  fact  would  be  an  all-sufficient  argument  against  the  practice 

3.  of  "running  bills."     You  have  no  right  to  buy  anything 

4.  you  cannot  afford.     If  you  have  not  the  money  with 

5.  which  to  pay  for  anything,  you  cannot  afford  to  buy 

6.  it.     The  necessity  for  paying  cash  for  every  article  bought 

7.  cannot  be  too  strongly  insisted  upon.    Saving  is  well-nigh  impossi- 

8.  where  this  rule  is  violated.     Its  enforcement  may  require  a     [ble 

9.  pretty  sharp  self-denial,  but  that  is  the  very  best  possible 
10.  evidence  that  its  enforcement  is  needed,  and,  in  the  end, 


48  HOW  TO  MAKE  A  LIVING. 

1.  the  cash  buyer  is  sure  to  live  better  than  he 

2.  possibly  could  under  any  other  rule.     I  have  reference  here 

3.  only  to  the  purchase  of  articles  for  consumption.     It  is 

4.  no  part  of  my  purpose  to  discuss  the  system  of 

5.  credit  which  obtains  in  the  commercial  world,  and  which  is 

0.  governed  by  laws  of  its  own.     T  Another  objection  to  the 

7.  practice  of  making  bills,  and  the  one  most  frequently  urged, 

8.  lies  in  the  fact  that  debt  paralyzes  one,  saps  his 

9.  energies,  destroys  his  vitality,  and  so  lessens  his  power  to 
10.  make  money  and  weakens  his  purpose  to  save  it.     Large 

1.  debts  may  be  dealt  with  in  ways  which  are  not 

2.  available  in  the  case  of  small  ones.     Commercial  failure,  if 

3.  it  be  accompanied  by  no  dishonesty,  does  not  bring  disgrace 

4.  with  it;  and  debts  which  cannot  be  paid  may  be 

5.  disposed  of  by  compromise  with  creditors  or  by  process  of 

6.  bankruptcy,  leaving  the  debtor  free  to  begin  again.     It  is 

7.  not  so  with  petty  bills;  failure  to  pay  these  promptly 

8.  brings  disgrace.     There  is  a  conviction  on  the  part  of 

0.  those  who  know  the  facts,  and  worse  than  all,  a 

10.  consciousness  on  the  part  of  the  delinquent  debtor,  that  his 

1.  purchases  have  been  in  some  sense  fraudulent.     Small  bills  are 

2.  a  sort  of  dry  rot  upon  one's  finances,  which  very 

3.  few  people  can  withstand.     There  is  no  good  reason  for 

4.  making  them  in  any  case,  and  they  are  dangerous  always. 

5.  That  men  who  make  them  do  prosper  now  and  then, 

6.  in  spite  of  their  evil  influence,  is  true  enough,  and 

7.  so  do  men  recover  from  small-pox  and  yellow  fever  sometimes, 

8.  but  we  do  not  dread  those  scourges  the  less  on 

9.  that  account.     No  man  who  can  afford  to  have  open 

10.  accounts  against  him  at  the  grocer's,  the  butcher's,  the  drygoods 


HOW  TO  LIVE  ON  YOUR  INCOME.  49 


1.  man's,  and  the  baker's,  has  any  occasion  to  have  them, 

2.  while  those  who  feel  the  need  of  such  indulgence  are 

3.  the  very  people  who  cannot  afford  it  at  all.     a  When 

4.  one  reflects  upon  the  costliness  of  the  shams  to  which 

5.  nearly  everybody  resorts,  and  sees  what  sad  work  the}'  make 
('».  now  and  then,  it  seems  a  pity  that  custom  has 

7.  not  decreed  that  a  statement  of  every  man's  exact  financial 

8.  condition  shall  be  written  over  his  door.     No  observant  person 

9.  can  doubt  that  absolutely  unnecessary  expenditures,  which  add 

[literally  nothing 
10.  to  comfort,  constitute  a  considerable  item  in  the  sum  of 

1.  well-nigh  everybody's  outgo.     When  you  lay  aside  your  last  win- 

2.  overcoat  because,  while  it  is  whole  and  comfortable,  it  looks  [ter's 

3.  a  trifle  shabby,  and  buy  a  new  one  with  money 

4.  which  ought  to  have  gone  into  the  savings  bank,  you 

5.  are  shamming,  and  it  is  costing  you  a  good  deal, 
G.  too.     The  desire  to  dress  as  well  as  your  fellows 

T.  is  worthy  enough,  but  if  you  really  cannot  afford  to 
S.  do  so — which  is  to  say  that  to  do  so 
9.  you  must  use  money  which  ought  to  be  put  away 
10.  for  other  purposes — you  are  a  very  foolish  and  a 


1 .  very  cowardly  person  to  do  it  at  all.     It  is 

•>.  more  manly,  as  well  as  wiser,  to  dress  less  genteelly 

'•>.  than  your  fellows,  to  live  in  a  cheaper  house  than 

4.  they,  and  to  practise  economies  they  never  dreamed  of  practising, 
.">.  than  to  wrap  yourself  in  lies  as  you  do  whenever 

<>.  you  put  on  clothes  which  you  cannot  afford,  or  in 

~i .  any  other  way  spend  more  than  your  income  justifies  you 

5.  in  spending,  merely  for  the  sake  of  conforming  to  the 
9.  customs  of  those  about  you.     And  yet  there  are  very 

10.  few  people,  indeed,  who  do  not,  in  one  way  or 
4 


50  HOW  TO   MAKE  A  LIVING. 


1.  another,  act  falsehoods  of  this  kind  every  day.     How  many 

2.  men  are  there  with  moral  courage  enough  to  refrain  from 

3.  all  the  expenses  which  they  cannot  afford?     How  many  are 

4.  there  who  never  feel  that  they  pay  a  higher  rent 

5.  than  the}*  ought;  that  their  tailor's  bills  are  inconveniently  large; 
•  ;.  that  their  net  surplus,  after  paying  all,  is  smaller  than 

7.  it  should  be?     It  is  true  that  in  the  great 

8.  majority  of  cases  men  do  not  blame  themselves  for  these 

9.  results,  because  it  is  much  easier  and  less  humiliating  to 
10.  make  their  wives  and  families  the  scapegoats  for  their  own 

1.  sins  of  extravagance.     It  is  easier  to  sigh  and  say : 

2.  u  Well,  well,  a  family  is  an  expensive  luxury,"  than  honestly 

3.  to  own  that  one  has  been  a  moral  coward  and 

4.  spent  more  money  than  he  could  afford,  because  he  has 

5.  been  afraid  that  somebody  might  suspect  him  of  being  poorer 

6.  than  he  is.     A  very  wealthy  gentleman,  whose  history  I 

7.  happen  to  know,  began  life  with  absolutely  nothing.     He  left 

8.  home  a  mere  boy,  owning,  as  he  puts  it,  one 

9.  pair  of  tow  linen  trousers,  one  tow  linen  shirt,  and 

10.  one  tow  linen  suspender.     His  father,  a  shrewd  old  Scotchman, 

1.  gave  him  this  piece  of  parting  advice:  "  Money  that  you 

2.  haven't  earned  is  not  yours,  and  will  do  you  no 

3.  good.     Remember  that,  and  remember  that  everybody  around 

4.  more  money  than  he  can  afford."     The  boy  was  not     [you  spends 

5.  long  in  learning  what  this  last  statement  meant,  and  now 

6.  that  he  is  a  rich  man,  with  scores  of  boys 

7.  and  young  men  in  his  service,  he  often  tells  them 

8.  that  the  secret  of  prosperity  consists  in  remembering  that  nearly 

9.  everybody  is  a  spendthrift.     U  It  is  especially  important  that  you 
10.  shall  keep  your  own  personal  expenses  within  proper  limits.     As 


HOW  TO  LIVE  ON   YOUR  INCOME. 


1.  a  rule,  household  expenses  cannot  very  well  be  reduced  to 

2.  any  considerable  extent,  except  in  the  ways  already  pointed  out, 

3.  simply  because  they  do  not  greatly  exceed  the  measure  of 

4.  the  household  needs.     The  family  must  be  fed,  clothed,  housed, 

5.  and  warmed,  and  beyond  attention  to  the  proper  and  economical 
U.  purchase  of  the  supplies  needed  for  this  purpose,  it  is 

7.  not  often  that  economy  can  save  much  from  the  aggregate 

8.  of  expenditures  in  this  direction.     But  the  personal  expenses  of 

0.  nearly  every  man  greatly  exceed  the  measure  of  necessity.     The 
10.  waste  is  in  small  sums,  insignificant  in  themselves,  but  amounting 

1.  in  the  aggregate  to  a  good  deal.     A  large  share 

2.  of  the  money  thus  expended  is  used  in  supplying  artificial 

3.  or  imaginary  wants — wants  created  by  the  artificiality  of  our 

4.  lives  or  by  the  constant  sight  of  articles  which,  if 

5.  we  did  not  see,  we  should  never  think  of  wanting. 
C.  The  very  fact  that  the  vendors  of  these  things,  from 

7.  the  great  merchants  to  the  keepers  of  peanut  stands,  find 

8.  it  profitable  to  display  their  wares  to  the  public  gaze 

0.  at  considerable  cost  to  themselves,  is  proof  enough  of  the 
10.  unreality  of  the  wants  they  supply.     If  further  evidence  be 

1.  needed,  one  has  only  to  keep  an  account  of  the 

2.  things  he  buys  in  town  which  he  could  not  get 

3.  at  all  if  he  lived  in  the  country.     1[  To  deny 

4.  oneself  indulgences  of  this  sort  is  to  save  in  the 

5.  aggregate  a  good  deal  more  than  any  one  is  apt 
G.  to  think,  and  there  is  a  value  in  such  self-denial 

7.  of  even  greater  worth  than  the  money  it  enables  one 

8.  to  save.     It  cultivates  the  habit  of  self-control,  than  which 
0.  nothing  can  be  more  essential  to  success  of  any  kind. 

10.  Indeed,  it  is  the  absence  of  this  habit  which,  more 


52  HOW  TO  MAKE  A  LIVING. 

1.  than  any  other  one  thing,  makes  saving  impossible  to  many 

2.  people.     It  is  because  we  do  not  know  how  to 

3.  control  ourselves  and  to  deny  ourselves  that  so  many  of 

4.  us  fail,  not  only  to  save  money,  but  to  accomplish 

5.  any  other  end  we  set  before  us.     The  most  eminently 

6.  and  uniformly  successful  business  man  I  ever  knew  makes  it 

7.  a  rule  of  his  life  to  deny  himself  something  which 

8.  he  wants,  every  day.     In  his  youth  he  acquired  the 

!».  habit  of  smoking  for  the  sole  purpose  of  abandoning  it, 
10.  so  that  he  might  always  have  a  craving  appetite  to 

1.  keep  in  subjection,  confident  that  the  habit  of  self-control  which 

2.  this  would  give  him  would  be  of  great  advantage  to 

3.  him ;  and  that  it  has  been  there  can  be  no 

4.  doubt  whatever.     Its  effect  can  be  traced  all  through  his 

5.  vast  business  operations.     Temptations  to  launch  out  into  danger- 

6.  bring  no  danger  to  a  man  so  constantly  in  the     [ous  speculations 

7.  habit  of  subjecting  all  his  wishes  and  impulses  to  the 

8.  control  of  reason.     The  habit  gives  him,  too,  a  singular 

9.  mastery  over  others  as  well  as  himself,  and  to  the  [almost 
10.  remotest  corners  of  his  wide-reaching  business,  his  control  extends. 

1.  without  an  effort.     It  is  not  in  making  money  alone 

2.  that  he  has  succeeded.     He  has  undertaken  many  other  things 

3.  in  his  time,  and  has  never  yet  known  a  failure. 

4.  His  mastery  of  himself  makes  him  master  of  others,  and 

5.  almost  equally  master  of  circumstances.     It  is  precisely  this  habit 

6.  of  subjecting  impulse  to  judgment- informed  will  that  we  rail 

[persistency 

7.  in  estimating  character;   and  persistencj7  is  the  condition  of  all 

8.  worthy  achievement.     Without   it,  genius   itself  leads  only  to 

[brilliant 

9.  failure,  and  with  it  mediocrity  often  wins  the  reputation  which 
10.  we  are  accustomed  to  think  belongs  only  to  genius.     In 


HOW  TO  LIVE  ON  YOUR  INCOME.  53 


1.  investigating  the  great  problem  of  gravitation,  Sir  Isaac  Newton 

2.  a  number  of  the  most  ingenious  and  brilliant  guesses.    If     [made 

3.  he  had  contented  himself  with  these  he  would  not  have 

4.  solved  his  problem,  but  he  would  have  won  a  world- wide 

5.  fame  as  a  genius,  nevertheless.     And  if  he  had  been 
G.  less  truly  master  of  himself  than  he  was,  there  can 

7.  be  no  doubt  that  he  would  have  cherished  and  defended 

8.  these  brilliant  conjectures  to  the  last.     As  it  was,  he 

9.  weighed  and  tested  each,  scrutinizing  it  as  closely  as  if 
10.  it  had  been  the  guess  of  a  rival  of  whom 

1.  he  was  jealous.     Regardless  of  its  brilliancy,  its  ingenuity,  its 
•^.  capacity  to  reflect  credit  upon  himself;  regardless,  also,  of  toil 

3.  and  delay ;  regardless  of  everything  but  truth,  he  examined  each 

4.  of  his  hypotheses  and  rejected  each  in  its  turn,  until 

5.  by  the  method  of  exclusion  he  sifted  error  out,  and 

6.  left  only  the  grain  of  truth  with  which  the  world 

7.  has  linked  his  name.     It  was  by  self-control  and  persistency 

8.  of  character  that  he  finally  reached  the  end  he  sought, 

(.i.  and  this  homely  habit  contributed  a  good  deal  more  than 
10.  his  genius  did  to  the  building  of  his  enduring  fame. 

1.  And  it  is  precisely  the  same  in  all  other  walks 

2.  of  life.     Massena  and  Macdonald  were  not  altogether  the  most 

3.  gifted  soldiers  Napoleon  had  with  him  in  the  field,  and 

4.  yet  they  succeeded  in  accomplishing  things  which  none  of  their 

5.  fellow-marshals  could  have  achieved.     At  Essling,  where  Napo- 

[leon  was  beaten, 

6.  the  successful  withdrawal  of  his  army  depended  upon  the  power 

7.  of  Massena  to  hold  his  position  for  a  considerable  time. 

8.  The  task  was  so  difficult  of  accomplishment  that  even  the 

9.  imperious  will  of  Napoleon  shrank  from  demanding  it  of  his 
10.  marshal.     Instead  of  an  order,  therefore,  he  sent  a  request 


54  HOW   TO  MAKE  A  LIVING. 


1 .  that  Marshal  Massena  should  hold  his  position  for  two  hours. 
•>.  The  indomitable  Marshal  had  been  battling  ceaselessly  for  more 

[  than 
;>.  forty  hours  already,  was  exhausted,  sick,  half  dead,  and  could 

4.  barely  sit  erect  and  look  with  bloodshot  eyes  at  the 

5.  messenger  as  he  delivered  the  request  of  Napoleon.     But  Massena 
<;.  was  absolute  master  of  ^Massena,  and  his  reply  was:  "  Tell 

7.  the  Emperor  I  will  hold  out  two  hours — six — twenty-four — 

8.  as  long  as  may  be  necessary  for  the  safety  of 

9.  the  army."     And  he  did  what  he  promised.     He  must 
10.  be  a  poor  reader  of  biography  who  has  failed  to 

1 .  discover  that  the  universal  key  to  success  is  mastery  of 

2.  self.     It  was  this  which  enabled  Washington,  with  a  handful 

3.  of  well-nigh  mutinous  men  in  an  impoverished  country,  to  hold 

4.  out  for  seven  long  years  against  well-disciplined,  well-equipped, 

[well-fed  and 

5.  well-armed  foes,  and  ultimately  to  convert  failure  into  success.     It 

6.  was  this  which  made  Pitt  the  most  renowned  statesman  of 

7.  his  time  or  of  any  time.     It  was  this  which  [took, 

8.  made  Franklin  a  phenomenon  of  success  in  everything  he  under- 

9.  from  money-making  in  a  little  shop  to  diplomacy  and  statesman- 
10.  It  was  this  which  enabled  the  Astors,  Stewarts,  Girards  and  [ship. 

1.  Coopers  of  the  country  to  build  colossal  fortunes  from  nothing; 
•-i.  and  it  is  this  which  must  underlie  every  genuine  success, 
o.  large  or  small,  achieved  in  any  walk  of  life.     If 

4.  you  feel  that  you  are  not  master  of  yourself,  that  [tipathies 

5.  your  impulses,  your  hopes,  your  fears,  your  longings,  your  an- 
ii.  are  not  under  the  dominion  of  your  judgment  and  your 

7.  will,  be  sure  that  there  are  holes  in  your  armor, 

8.  and  that  you  are  in  no  fit  condition  to  engage 

9.  in  the  battle  of  life.     Man  is  so  wholly  the 

10.  creature  of  habit  that  he  may  make  himself,  to  a 


LIFE    INSURANCE.  55 


1.  great  extent,  what  it  pleases  him  to  be.     To  acquire 

2.  the  habit  of  doing  a  thing,  you  have  only  to 

3.  do  it  constantly  and  persistently.     To  form  the  habit  of     [every 

4.  self-control,  you  must  control  yourself.     Cross  your  impulses  at 

5.  opportunity.     Deny  yourself  coveted  indulgences.     Spur  yourself 

[to  continued  exertion 

0.  when  you  weary  of  a  task,  and,  if  your  case 

7.  be  a  bad  one,  persist  in  undertaking  and  accomplishing  distasteful 

8.  things.     And  it  is  a  mistake  to  suppose  that  a 

9.  habit  of  this  sort  brings  unhappiness  with  it.     On  the 
10.  contrary,  it  is  the  key  to  happiness  as  to  everything 

1.  else.     There  is  no  real,  or  at  least  no  permanent  [ness; 

2.  pleasure  in  momentary  indulgences;  there  is  no  pleasure  in  weak- 

3.  there  is  none,  certainly,  in  failure.     It  is  conscious  strength 

4.  which  is  genuinely  happy,  and  well-earned  success  brings  a  joy 

5.  with  it"  which  nothing  else  can  produce.     No  man  is 

6.  so  truly  free  as  he  who  knows  himself  his  own 

7.  only  master. 

CHAPTER  VI. 

LIFE    INSURANCE. 

1.  Without  question  it  is  the  duty  of  well-nigh  everybody  to 

2.  provide  by  life  insurance  methods  against  contingencies ;  but  it  is 

3.  equally  unquestionable  that  the  advice  of  agents  and  other  inter- 

4.  persons  is  not  always  to  be  taken  at  its  assumed  [ested 

5.  value.     It  would  seem  that  everybody  ought  by  this  time 

6.  to  know  certainly  what  the  thing  is  about  which  there 

7.  has  been  so  much  said  and  written,  but  there  is, 

8.  after  all,  reason  to  doubt  whether  most  people  really  do 

9.  understand  it.   To  many  it  seems  a  marvellously  productive  system 
10.  of  investment,  while  there  are  incredulous  others  who  are  half 


56  HOW  TO   MAKE  A  LIVING. 

1.  inclined  to  reject  it  altogether  as  a  preposterous  device  for 

2.  the  creation  of  something  out  of  nothing,  or  for  the 

3.  delusion  of  unsuspecting  persons.     In  fact  it  is  none  of 

4.  these  things.     The  life  insurance  company  literally  gives  no  more 

5.  than  it  receives.     It  creates  no  wealth,  and  undertakes  to 

<;.  create  none.     It  promises  nothing  more  than  it  can  accomplish 

7.  b}'  plain  business  methods.     Moreover,  life  insurance  is  not  an 

8.  especially  profitable  investment,  reckoning  the  returns  it  makes 

1 1'<  >r  the 

9.  money  it  receives.     The  premiums  paid,  on  an  average,  would 
10.  make  more  than  the  faces  of  the  policies  they  represent 

1.  if  kept  at  interest  during  the  lifetime  of  the  persons 

2.  insured.     In  other  words,  if  one  could  be  sure  of 

3.  life  during  the  period  known  as  his  "expectation,"  which  is 

4.  simply  the  average  period  during  which  people  of  his  age 

5.  live,  his  annual  premiums  placed  at  interest  and  the  interest 

6.  annually  re-invested,  would  yield  more  than  the  amount  which  the 

7.  life  insurance  company  undertakes  to  return  at  his  death,     ^i  But 

8.  no  man  can  know  how  long  he  is  to  live, 

9.  and  if  he  should  die  before  the  average  time,  the 
10.  sum  he  set  out  to  accumulate  in  this  way  would 

1.  not  be  forthcoming.     He  must  take  the  risk  of  his 

2.  own  death,  which  ma}7  come  at  any  time,  and  if 

3.  his  property  is  insufficient  for  the  support  of  his  family, 

4.  he  cannot  afford  to  take  such  a  risk.     He  wishes, 

5.  for  instance,  to  leave  his  family  five  thousand  dollars  at 

6.  his  death.     He  may  put  away  at  interest  every  year 

7.  the  amount  of  the  premium  charged  on  a  life  policy, 

8.  reinvest  all  its  interest,  and  if  he  lives  as  long 

9.  as  men  of  his  age  do  on  an  average,  the 

10.  fund  will  exceed  the  desired  amount.     But  there  is  a 


LIFE    INSURANCE.  57 


1.  chance  that  he  may  not  live  so  long,  and  in 

2.  that  event  he  must  fail  in  his  effort  and  leave 

3.  those  dependent  upon  him  without  the  provision  he  had  purposed 

4.  making  for  them.     Now  it  is  against  this  chance,  and 

5.  this  only,  that  ordinary  life  insurance  is  intended  to  provide. 

6.  While  it  is  impossible  to  say  how  long  any  one 

7.  man  will  live,  we  know  certainly  .what  the  average  life 

8.  of  a  thousand  men  of  any  given  age  will  be, 

,9.  and  the  life  insurance  companies  take  advantage  of  this  certain 
10.  knowledge  and  by  clubbing  together  the  sums  each  must  put 

1.  away  annually  in  order  that  at  the  end  of  this 

'2.  average  time  each  may  have  the  desired  sum,  it  may 

3.  with  perfect  safety  guarantee  the  amount  to  each.     It  bases 

4.  all  its  calculations  upon  this.     It  is  assumed  in  the 

5.  first  place,  that  the  average  life  of  those  insured  will 

6.  not  exceed  the  average  of  the  whole  community,  although  every 

7.  precaution  is  taken  to  exclude  from  the  company  all  sickly, 

8.  unsound  people,  who  greatly  diminish  the  community's  average; 

9.  assumed  also  that  the  money  placed  in  the  company's  hands  [it  is 
10.  will  earn  no  more  than  four  and  a  half  per 

1.  cent,  while  in  fact  it  earns  half  as  much  more; 

2.  it  is  assumed  that  all  the  policies  issued  will  mature 

3.  and  become  a  charge  on  the  company,  while,  in  truth, 

4.  a  very  large  number  of  them  are  abandoned  altogether  after 

5.  one  or  more  premiums  have  been  paid  upon  them;  and 

6.  lastly,  every  premium  is  made  greater  than  it  need  be 

7.  to  produce  the  sum  expected  of  it.     Agents  soliciting  business 

8.  sometimes  assert,  and  even  endeavor  to  prove,  that  life  insurance, 

9.  considered  solely  as  an  investment,  is  better  than  any  other; 
10.  but  this  is  not  true,  as  any  one  may  discover 


58  HOW  TO  MAKE  A  LIVING. 


1.  by  a  very  simple  arithmetical  calculation,  and  it  is  altogether 

2.  to  the  credit  of  the  sj'stem  that  it  does  not 

:5.  offer  special  inducements  in  this  way.     Its  mission  is  of 

4.  another  sort,  and  to  fulfil  that  properly  it  must  keep 

5.  all  the  margins  of  safety  on  the  side  of  the 

6.  company.    To  make  life  insurance  profitable  as  an  investment,  \ve 

7.  must  make  it  untrustworthy  as  insurance.     Life  insurance  has  a 
N.  distinct  value  in  the  compulsion  it  puts  one  under  to 

9.  save.     When  a  policjT  has  once  been  written  and  a 
10.  premium  or  two  paid  upon  it,  one  is  very  strongly 

1.  impressed  with  the  necessity  of  continuing  the  payments,  even  at 

2.  cost  of  considerable  self-denial,  and  in  this  way  persons  who 

3.  find  it  difficult  to  save  anything  may  create  an  incentive 

4.  to  economy  which  they  greatly  need.     It  is  clear  enough, 

5.  however,  in  any  case,  that  no  man  who  has  others 

6.  dependent  upon  his  exertions  has  a  right  to  neglect  the 

7.  opportunity  which  life  insurance  affords  of  providing  for  his 

8.  in  the  event  of  his  death,  and  so  making  actual  [family 

9.  and  certain  a  considerable  share,  at  least,  of  the  results 
10.  which  he  has  reason  to  hope  for  from  the  work 

1.  of  his  lifetime.     *  But  there  are  right  ways  and  wrong 

•2.  ways  of  attending  to  this  duty,  and  so  far  as  [followed 

o.  my  observation  extends,  the  wrong  ways  are  more  frequently 

4.  than  the  right  ones,  chiefly  because  life  insurance  solicitors  find 

o.  it  profitable  to  themselves  to  urge  the  wrong  sort  of 

•I.  policies  upon  their  clients.     A  careful  examination  of  statistics  has 

7.  taught  actuaries  not  only  what  the  average  life  of  men 

8.  of  any  given  age  is  and  must  be,  but  also 

9.  precisely  what  is  one  man's  chance  of  death  during  each 
10.  year.     If,  for  example,  it  is  found  that  of  a 


LIFE    INSURANCE.  59 


1.  thousand  men  of  a  given  age  five  die  within  the 

2.  3*ear,  then  the  chances  of  death,  in  any  individual  case, 

3.  are  as  five  to  one  thousand,  or  one  in  two 

4.  hundred.     Now,  in  such  a  case  the  actual  net  premium 

5.  required  to  insure  the  lives  of  these  people  for  one 

ti.  year  would  be  five  dollars  for  every  thousand  dollars  of 

7.  insurance.     This,  of  course,  is  a  statement  of  the  problem 

8.  in  its  simplest  elements,  leaving  out  of  the  account  the 

9.  interest  which  the  premium  will  earn,  as  well  as  the 

10.  expenses  incurred  in  carrying  on  the  business,  the  amount  usually 

1.  added  for  the  sake  of  perfect  safety,  etc.     I  use 

2.  it  in  this  form  simply  for  the  sake  of  convenience 

3.  in  illustrating  the  point,  which  is  that  the  actuary  may 

,4.  determine,  with   absolute   certainty  and  accuracy,  how  much 
5.  one  of  a  thousand  or  of  ten  thousand  men  of  [money  each 

(i.  any  given  age,  must  pay  into  a  common  fund  to 

7.  insure  the  life  of  each  for  one  year,  and  the 

8.  sum  thus  ascertained  is  the  first  year's  premium.     But  the 

9.  chances  of  death  increase  with  every  year  of  age,  and 

10.  hence  the  premium  must  increase  in  precisely  the  same  proportion, 

1.  and,  to  guard  against  this,  a  calculation  of  the  average 

2.  premium  during  the  life  expectancy  is  made,  and  this  average 

3.  premium,  greater  than  the  actual  one  of  the  early  years, 

4.  and  less  than  that  of  the  later  years,  is  fixed 

5.  upon  as  the  amount  to  be  paid  every  year,  from 
<5.  first  to  last,  in  lieu  of  a  series  of  steadily 

7.  increasing  and  at  last  very  burdensome  annual  payments.    In  this 

8.  way  the  matter  is  greatly  simplified  in  practice,  and  the 

9.  difficulty  of  carrying  insurance  lessened,  while  by  collecting  more 
10.  is  necessary  during  the  early  years,  the  company  secures  to    [than 


60  HOW   TO   MAKE   A   LIVING. 

1.  itself  a  considerable  margin  of  profit  on  those  policies  which 

2.  shall  be  allowed  to  lapse  before  maturity.     The  simplest  form 

3.  of  policy  in  common  use  is  one  in  which  these 

4.  average  premiums  are  continued  throughout  the  life  of  the  person 

5.  insured,  and  the  amount  for  which  he  is  insured  is 

6.  to  become  due  at  his  death.     This  is  life  insurance 

7.  pure  and  simple,  and  as  the  premiums  in  this  case 

8.  are  spread  over  the  greatest  possible  length  of  time,  a 

9.  policy  of  this  kind  demands  smaller  annual  payments  than  anv 
10*.  other  possibty  can.     In  determining  the  average  the  \vh<»!c  }>eriod 

1.  of  expectancy  has  been  adopted  as  the  basis.     Next  come 

2.  policies  payable  at  death,  the  premiums  on  which  are  continued 

3.  not  during  the  whole  life  of  the  person  insured,  but 

4.  during  a  specific  number  of  years, — five,  ten  or  twenty, 

5.  usually — if  he  live  so  long.     The  premiums  in  this 

(>.  case  are  ascertained  by  a  calculation  of  chances  precisely  like 

7.  that  already  explained;  but  in  this  case  as  the  premium 

8.  payments  are  to  be  continued  during  a  smaller  number  of 

9.  years  they  must  of  course  be  proportional!}'  larger  while  they 
10.  do  continue.     These  are  the  only  kinds  of  pure  life 

1.  insurance  policies  in  common  use,  the  only  ones  in  which 

2.  insurance  alone  is  sought  and  secured.     But  of  late  years 

3.  various  other  things  have  been  combined  with  life  insurance,  so 

4.  that  in  practice  a  very  large  share  of  the  business 

5.  done  under  the  name  of  insurance  is,  in  reality,  insurance 

6.  plus  something  else, — and  the  something  else  must  be  paid 

7.  for  in  every  case.     This  is  done  principally  by  what 

8.  are  called  endowment  policies;  namely,  policies  on  which  the 

9.  are  to  be  paid  annually,  either  during  a  term  of  [premiums 
10.  years  or  until  the  maturity  of  the  policy ;  and  the 


LIFE    INSURANCE.  61 


1.  amount  of  the  insurance  is  to  be  paid  to  the 

2.  insured  when  he  shall  attain  a  specified  age,  or  to 

3.  those  in  whose  behalf  the  policy  is  issued,  at  his 

4.  death,  if  he  shall  happen  to  die  before  reaching  that 

5.  age.     An  example  will  make  this  plainer,  perhaps,  than  any 

6.  general  statement  can.     Let  us  take,  by  way  of  illustration, 

7.  a  ten  annual  payment  endowment  policy  for  ten  thousand  dollars, 

8.  payable  at  death  or  at  the  age  of  fifty  years. 

9.  The  amount  of  the  annual  premium  will  depend  upon  the 
10.  age  of  the  applicant,  but  whatever  it  may  be,  he 

1.  agrees  to  pay  that  premium  annually  during  ten  years.     If 

2.  he  die  at  any  time  before  reaching  the  age  of 

3.  fifty,  the  ten  thousand  dollars  becomes  due  at  once,  and 

4.  must  be  paid  to  the  person  named  in  the  policy 

5.  as  the  beneficiary.     At  the  age  of  fifty,  if  he 

6.  live  to  attain  it,  the  amount  must  be  paid  to 

7.  the  person  himself  on  whose  life  the  policy  was  taken. 

8.  There  are  other  forms  of  endowment  policies  in  use,  but 

0.  in  principle  they  are  all  identical.     Their  value  is  manifest 
10.  and  unquestioned,  and  while  there  are  cases  enough  in  which 

1.  it  is  best  to  secure,  in  this  way,  the  endowment 

2.  of  one's  later  years,  I  am  satisfied  that  in  the 

3.  great  majority  of  instances  policies  of  this  kind  are  not 

4.  to  be  recommended,  particularly  to  young  men.     *;  It  is  your 

5.  first  duty  to  secure  insurance  for  an  amount  sufficient  to 

6.  make  the  comfort  of  your  family  and  the  education  of 

7.  your  children  as  certain  as  human  affairs  can  be.     Now, 

8.  if  your  ability  to  pay  premiums  be  limited,  as  it 

9.  is  in  most  cases,  there  are  several  reasons  why  you 

10.  cannot  afford  to  take  an  endowment  policy.     The  first  and 


62  HOW  TO  MAKE  A  LIVING. 

1.  principal  difficulty  is  that  by  taking  this  kind  of  policy 
•>.  you  may  be  compelled,  on  account  of  the  high  premium 
:>.  rates  involved,  to  insure  for  a  less  amount  than  your 

4.  duty  to  your  family  requires,  and  where  this  is  the       [wronging 

5.  case,  you  cannot  take  an  endowment  policy  without  manifestly 
i '» .  those  for  whose  benefit  you  are  insuring,  and  deli  berately  def o;  1 1  i  ?  i  g 
I .  the  very  purpose  which  life  insurance  is  designed  to  sc-rve. 

8.  Even  when  this  is  not  the  case,  it  may  be 
'.i.  bad  policy  to  do  so.     The  payment  of  heavy  premiums 
10.  may  very  seriously  embarrass  your  business  operations,  or  it  may 

1.  so  far  reduce  your  income  as  to  compel  a  system 

•2.  of  economy  hurtful  to  your  children  in  moral,  mental  or 

:>.  physical  respects.     In  short,  you  may  be  abundant!}'  able  to 

4.  purchase  life  insurance,  and  yet  not  able,  with  justice  to 

5.  those  dependent  upon  you,  to  buy  with  it  an  endowment 
(').  for  yourself.     If  you  are  a  man  of  ordinary  energy 

7.  and  capacit}',  you  will  not  need  the  endowment  when  it 

8.  shall  fall  due  half  as  badly  as  you  now  need 
!>.  the  money  you  must  now  pay  for  it.     In  this 

10.  country  the  presumption  is  a  strong  one  that  a  man 

1.  of  intelligence^  sobriety  and  industry,  will  find  himself  in  toler- 

2.  comfortable  circumstances  at  the  age  of  fifty  or  sixty,  and    [ably 

3.  while  even  then  an  additional  sum  of  five  or  ten 

"  4.  thousand  dollars  is  very  desirable,  it  is  rarely  ever  worth 
5.  what  such  a  sum  secured  by  endowment  policy  has  cost. 
(5.  But  the  strongest  reason  of  all  for  refusing  to  buy 

7.  endowment  with  one's  life  insurance  is  that  the  money  paid 

8.  for  it  can  l>e  so  invested  that  it  will  produce 

0.  more  than  it  does  in  this  way.     The  chance  of  [does  not 

10.  premature  death  which  justifies  investments   in   life  insurance 


LIFE    INSURANCE.  63 


1.  in  any  way  affect  the  present  question,  because  in  the 

2.  event  of  death  you  get  no  endowment  at  all,  but 

3.  only  insurance.     By  mingling  insurance  with  endowment  the 

[companies  manage 

4.  to  hide  the  fact  that  the  purchaser  of  an  endowment 

5.  pays  more  for 'it  than  he  would  if  he  should 

6.  create  it  himself,  by  putting  its  price  out  at  compound 

7.  interest.     I  do  not  wholh"  condemn  the  endowment  system,  by 

8.  any  means.     There  are  many  persons  whose  circumstances,  tem- 

[perament,  etc., 

9.  make  it  advisable  that  they  shall  purchase  endowments,  even  at 
10.  the  price  which  the  companies  are  compelled  to  charge  for 

1.  them.     But  as  a  general  rule,  it  is  much  safer 

2.  and  better  every  way  to  secure  pure  and  simple  life 

3.  insurance.     *[  We  have  remaining  two  kinds  of  ordinary  life  poli- 

4.  to  choose  between.     These  are :  first,  a  policy  payable  at       [cies 

5.  death,  with  premiums  payable  annually  during  life ;  and, second,  a 

6.  policy  payable  at  death,  with  premiums  payable  annually  during  a 

7.  term  of  years.     The  difference  between  these  is  one  of 

8.  premiums  only.     The  limited  payment  policy, — i.e.,  a  policy 

0.  011  which  payments  are  to  cease  after  a  term  of 

10.  years, — has  the  advantage  of  offering  a  certain  limit  to 

1.  the  payment  of  premiums.     We  know  at  the  outset  the 

2.  aggregate  of  its  possible  cost.     Every  year  brings  its  holder 

3.  nearer  to  the  time  when  he  shall  have  a  paid 

4.  up  policy,  and  lessens  the  chance  of  ultimate  failure  through 

5.  inability  to  pay.     It  must  be  remembered  that  the  premiums 

6.  in  this  kind  of  insurance  are  considerably  greater  than  those 

7.  on  an  all-life  policy,  and  the  additional  cost  is  apt 

8.  to  tempt  the  applicant  to  content  himself  with  a  smaller 

9.  amount  of  insurance  than  he  actually  needs.     This  is  the 

10.  objection  to  limited  payment  policies  which  applies  in  a  larger 


64  HOW  TO  MAKE  A  LIVING. 


1.  number  of  cases  than  any  other.     Again,  the  applicants  for 

2.  insurance  are  for  the  most  part  young  men,  and  it 

3.  is  generally  unwise  for  such  to  withdraw  from  their  business, 

4.  for  insurance  purposes,  more  money  than  they  must,  to  secure 

5.  their  object.     It  will  prove  more  profitable  to  most  of 

6.  them  to  keep  their  money  in  active  business.     There  is 

7.  a  greater  chance  of  failure,  too,  with  the  limited  payment 

8.  policy  than  with  any  other.     As  a  matter  of  course, 

9.  it  is  always  easier  to  pay  a  small  than  a 

10.  large  sum,  and  the  smaller  one's  annual  premium  is  the 

1.  surer  he  may  be  of  his  continued  ability  to  meet 

2.  the  payments  as  they  shall  fall  due.     Security  being  the 

3.  one  essential  in  this  matter,  everything  which  adds  to  it, 

4.  everything  which  diminishes  the  chances  of  failure,  is  well  worth 

5.  considering.     Lastly,  in  our  country,  at  least,  one's  early  years 

6.  are  usually  one's  years  of  struggle.     You  have  every  reason 

7.  to  hope  that  ten  or  twent}-  years  hence  you  will 

8.  be  much  better  able  to  pay  your  insurance  premiums  than 

9.  you  are  now,  and  this  being  the  case,  it  seems 

10.  in  the  last  degree  foolish  to  lay  an  unnecessary  burden 

1.  upon  your  years  of  struggling  for  the  sake  of  avoiding 

2.  in  later  life  a  charge  which  is  likely  then  to 

3.  be  easily  borne.     To  see  the  force  of  this,  you 

4.  have  only  to  look  at  the  history  of  your  acquaintances 

5.  during  the  ten  or  twenty  years  following  their  marriage      Hardly 

6.  one  of  them,  you  will  find,  was  as  well  off 

7.  at  marriage  as  now,  and  while  most  of  them,  ten 

8.  or  twenty  years  ago,  would  have  sorely  felt  an  additional 

9.  expense  of  a  hundred  dollars  every  year,  most  of  them 
10.  are  abundantly  able  now  to  meet  such  a  payment  without 


LIFE    INSURANCE. 


1.  inconvenience.     The  holder  of  an  all-life  policy  may  at  will 

2.  change  it  for  one  of  the  limited  payment  kind,  if 

3.  at  any  time  he  shall  find  it  desirable  to  do 

4.  so,  and  hence  in  choosing  the  less  burdensome  one  he 

5.  does  not  necessarily  bind  himself  to  continue  payments  during  the 
(i.  whole  term  of  his  natural  life.     He  reserves  to  himself, 

7.  in  fact,  all  the  rights  which  he  would  have  in 

8.  the  other  case.     If  it  be  one's  duty  to  insure 

9.  at  all,  it  is  his  duty  to  insure  for  an 

10.  amount  sufficient  to  provide  for  the  comfort  and  welfare  of 

1.  his  family  after  his  death,  if  he  possibly  can  ;  and 

2.  if  that  be  impossible,  he  is  clearly  bound  to  secure 

3.  as  much  insurance  as  he  can  "  carry .".    Beyond  this  there 

4.  is  grave  reason  to  question  the  value  of  life  insurance, 

5.  and  it  is  the  opinion  of  many  shrewd  observers  that 
0.  too  much  insurance  is  nearly  as  common  as  too  little. 

7.  *[  Every  agent  will  name  his  own  first,  of  course,  admitting, 

8.  perhaps,  that  there  are  a  few  others  nearly  as  good,    [panies  there 

0.  The  fact  is  that  between  the  well-established,  conservative  com- 
10.  is  little  choice.     They  all  base  their  calculations  upon  the 

1.  same  mortality  tables  and  the  same  low  rates  of  interest. 

2.  They  all  charge  practically  the  same  premium  rates,  and  they 

3.  are  all  perfectly  safe.     But  there  are  unsafe  companies  too. 

4.  These  are  the  ones  which  offer  "special  inducements,"  or  under- 

[take 

5 .  to  unite  politics  or  denominational  theology  or  partisanship  of  some 
r>.  other  sort  with  business,  appealing  to  prejudice  for  patronage. 

7.  of  every  man  and  every  company  which  offers  to  do        [Beware 

8.  the  business  of  life  insurance  on  any  but  the  strictest 

9.  and  most  conservative  business  principles.     Men  who  ask  credit  or 

10.  patronage  on  the  strength  of  their  theological  opinions  or  theii 
5 


66  HOW  TO  MAKE  A   LIVING. 

1.  political  leanings,  and  men  who  offer  to  take  risks  of 

2.  any  sort  for  a  smaller  compensation  than  the  nature  of 

3.  the  risk  justifies,  are  to  be  shunned  in  any  business ; 

4.  and  especially  dangerous  are  such  people  in  a  matter  like 

5.  life  insurance,  in  which  perfect  security  is  the  one  thing 

6.  needful.     Dividends  and  other  inducements  of  that  kind  are  of 

7.  small  account  at  best,  and  are  for  the  most  part 

S.  illusory.     Every  sound  company  does  business  at  fair,  safe  rates; 
9.  the  cost  is  almost  exactly  the  same  in  all  of 
10.  them ;  and  whatever  agents  may  urge  as  regards  low  rates, 

1.  participation  in  profits,  etc.,  the  fact  is  well  established  that 

2.  it  costs  just  as  much  to  insure  in  one  good 

3.  company  as  in  another.     The  important  point  is  to  beware 

4.  of  companies  that  are  not  good ;  and  inasmuch  as  the 

5.  basis  of  calculation  is  precisely  the  same  in  all  companies, 

6.  those  that  offer  "  special  inducements"  of  one  kind  or  another 

7.  are  doubtful  ones. 


CHAPTER  VII. 

WHAT  TO  DO  WITH  SAVINGS. 

1.  In  the  first  place,  one  should  never  allow  any  part 

2.  of  his  money  or  property  to  lie  idle.     The  capacity 

3.  of  money  to  work  and  to  earn  wages  is  well 

4.  enough  known,  doubtless,  but  it  certainly  is  not  as  generally 

5.  recognized  and  acted  upon  as  it  should  be,  particularly  in 

6.  the  matter  of  small  sums.     The  interest  on  a  few 

7.  dollars  is  apt  to  seem  too  small  a  thing  to 

8.  deserve  attention,  but  the  fallacy  of  this  becomes  evident  if 

9.  we  reflect  that  at  simple  interest  of  six  per  cent 

10.  money  doubles  itself  while  one's  children  are  growing  to  manhood, 


WHAT  TO   DO  WITH   SAVINGS.  67 


1.  and  if  the  interest  be  promptly  reinvested,  or  added  to 

2.  principal  twice  a  year,  as  is  done  in  the  savings 

3.  banks,  it  will  multiply  itself  by  three  within  the  nonage 

4.  of  one's  children.     Now  the  smaller  your  savings  are,  the 

5.  greater  is  your  need  of  the  earnings  they  are  capable 

0.  of  making,  and  even  if  you  have  some  other  investment 

7.  in  view, — some  investment  to  be  made  as  soon  as 

8.  a  sufficient  sum  for  the  purpose  shall  be  accumulated,— it 

9.  is  unwise  to  allow  your  weekly  savings  to  lie  idle  [interest 
10.  meanwhile.     However  brief  the  time,  and  however  small  the 

1.  may  be,  your  money  should  be  made  to  work  while 

2.  it  waits.     For  this  purpose,  and  particularly  in  the  case 

3.  of  small  savings,  the  savings  banks  offer  altogether  the  best 

4.  and  most  convenient  facilities.     One  can  deposit  very  small  sums 

5.  there  at  any  time,  and  so  long  as  they  remain 

6.  they  earn  semi-annual,  compound  interest,  which  is  to  say  that 

7.  they  double  themselves  in  about  twelve  years,  with  a  proportionate 

8.  earning  for  shorter  periods.     Here,  certainly,  is  a  matter  de- 

9.  attention,  and  it  would  seem  incredible  if  we  did  not       [serving 
10.  know  it  to  be  a  fact  that  men  who  can 

1 .  never  afford  to  be  idle  for  a  single  day,  allow 

2.  their  money  to  do  nothing  when  it  might  be  earning 

3.  something  all  the  time.     1"  A  second  point  in  determining  what 

4.  one's  investments  shall  be  is  safety.     So  far  as  your 

5.  small  weekly  or  monthly  savings  are  concerned,  the  only  way 
G.  in  which  they  can  commonly  be  made  to  earn  anything 

7.  is  by  deposit  in.  a  savings  bank,  and  these  institutions,         [posit 

8.  particularly  the  older  ones,  afford  every  guaranty  of  safety.     De- 

9.  them  promptly  in  every  case.     But  with  larger  amounts  a    [come 
10.  variety  of  investments  becomes  possible,  and  with  this  possibility 


68  HOW  TO  MAKE  A   LIVING. 

1 .  temptation  and  danger.     The  owner  of  a  few  hundreds  or 

2.  a  few  thousands  of  dollars  is  pretty  sure  to  have 

3.  pressed  upon  him  various  plans  by  which  his  cash  can 

4.  be  made  to  pay  much  larger  returns  than  the  six 

5.  or  seven  per  cent  of  ordinary  loans.     There  are  state, 

G.  county,  school,  township  and  railroad  bonds  to  be  had  in 

7.  every  broker's  shop,  which  pay  or  promise  to  pay,  directly 

8.  or  indirectly,  ten,  twelve,  or  fifteen  per  cent,  and  when 
ii.  one  feels  the  necessity  of  making  his  money  work,  he 

10.  is  very  apt  also  to  desire  that  it  shall  earn 

1.  good  wages,  and  the  temptation  to  invest  it  in  securities 

2.  of  the  sort  described  is  greatly  increased  by  the  plausible 

3.  showing  which  the  vendors  of  the  securities  are  always  prepared 

4.  to  make  for  them.     Now  it  is  undeniable  that  in 

5.  some  cases  money  has  been  made  by  the  purchase  of 

6.  these  bonds  below  their  par  value,  but  it  is  nevertheless 

7.  true  that  such  purchases  are  never  safe  and  never  can 

8.  be.    A  county  or  corporation  so  badly  off  for  money 
li.  that  it  must  borrow  it  at  eight  or  ten  per 

10.  cent  interest,  affords  no  very  great  security  for  ultimate  payment. 

1.  And  when  its  credit  is  so  bad  that  in  addition 

2.  to  promising  high  rates  of  interest  it  must  sell  its 

3.  bonds  for  less  than  their  face,  the  insecurity  of  the 

4.  investment  ought  to  be  apparent  upon  its  face.     It  should 

5.  be  remembered  that  there  is  always  a  vast  amount  of 

i'-.   money  in  New  York  earnestly  seeking  investment.     It  belongs  to 

7.  people  skilled  in  discovering  the  real  value  of  securities,  and 

8.  its  owners  are  abundantly  able  to  take  some  risk.     Under 

!».  these  circumstances  it  is  not  likely  that  any  really  well-secured 
10.  bonds,  bearing  seven,  eight  or  ten  per  cent  interest,  will 


WHAT  TO  DO  WITH   SAVINGS.  69 


1.  ever  lack  purchasers  at  or  above  par,  and  when  high 

2.  interest  bonds  are  hawked  upon  the  street  at  less  than 

3.  their  face,  we  may  be  very  sure  that  they  are 

4.  not  safe,  whatever  an  interested  broker  may  choose  to  say 

5.  in  their  favor.     It  is  a  universal  truth  that  high 

6.  interest  means  poor  security.     It  is  with  corporate  bodies  as 

7.  with  individuals.     Those  who  are  able  to  owe  and  to 

8.  pay  their  debts  have  no  occasion  to  raise  money  by 
!).  paying  more  than  it  is  worth.     They  may  have  need 

.  10.  to  borrow,  but  they  can  always  borrow  at  the  market 

1.  rate.     From  the  time  that  credit  first  entered  into  commercial 

2.  transactions  until  now,  men  have  been  busily  endeavoring  to 

[create 

3.  wealth  out  of  nothing,  and  now  and  then  theorists  imagine 

4.  that  they  have  discovered  how  to  accomplish  it.     It  is 

5.  so  easy  to  delude  not  one's  neighbors  only,  but  oneself 

6.  as  well,  with  sophistical  financial  reasoning  that  danger  is  present 

7.  wherever  credit  enters  into  business  transactions,  however  honest 

[and  well-meaning 

8.  the  authors  of  the  mischief  may  be.     Paper  money  is 

9.  in  itself  so  easy  a  thing  to  create  that  its 

10.  use  often  engenders  the  idea  that  wealth  itself  may  be 

1.  ground  out  of  a  paper-mill.     Gold  certainly  does  not  constitute 

•2.  real  wealth :  it  is  not  food,  clothing,  or  the  means 

3.  of  shelter,  all  of  which  are  so  many  items  of 

4.  real  wealth;  but  it  possesses  a  greater  intrinsic  value  than 

5.  paper,  and  therefore  is  not  so  completely  at  the  mercy 

6.  of  public  opinion.     Apart  altogether  from  its  fictitious  value  as 

7.  a  coin,  gold  is  a  useful  and  precious  metal  for 

8.  which  there  is  a  demand  in  the  arts;  and  the 

9.  cost  of  obtaining  it  from  the  bowels  of  the  earth 

10.  and  refining  it,  being  very  great,  every  little  piece  of 


70  HOW  TO  MAKE  A  LIVING. 


1.  gold  is,  as  it  were,  a  condensation  of  a  quantity 

2.  of  real  wealth  ;  paper,  on  the  other  hand,  is  a 

:;.   valuable  commodity  likewise;  but  the  cost  of  its  production  being 

4.  less,  it  really  has  less  intrinsic  value,  and  is  more 

5.  dependent  upon  public  opinion.     Paper  can  be  procured  as  abun- 
G.  as  we  choose  ;  but  there  is  a  limit  to  the  [dantly 
',  .  production  of  gold.     Gold  and  silver  are  dear  substances  in 

s.  themselves;  paper  is  a  very  cheap  substance.     The  value  of 
!).  a  metallic  currency,  therefore,  is  not  so  liable  to  fluctuation 
10.  as  one  entirely  of  paper.     The  American  people  know,  certainly, 

1.  that  the  law  cannot  make  money;  that  values  cannot  be 

2.  created  by  acts  of  Congress  ;  that  paper  is  worth  precisely 

3.  wha.t  it  genuinely  represents  and  no  more.     In  this  knowledge 

4.  we  have  a  safeguard  against  all  direct  attempts,  upon  a 

5.  large  scale,  at  least,  to  create  wealth  by  the  issue 

(!.  of  promises  to  pay.     But  we  are,  nevertheless,  beset  by 

7.  the  dangers  incident  to  false  theories  of  finance.     It  is 

8.  as  true  of  communities  as  of  individuals,  that  the  limit 
!).  of  earning  is  the  limit  of  safe  expenditure,  and  the 

10.  danger  lies  in  the  fact  that,  for  a  time,  excessive 

1.  expenditure,  in  the  case  of  communities,  may  be  concealed  by 

2.  the  various  devices  of  commercial  credit.     Every  business  man 


3.  how  individuals  sometimes  attempt  to  accomplish  the  same  end  by 

4.  the  process  known  in  the  commercial  world  as  "kite  flying," 

5.  and  yet,  when  great  corporations  fly  kites.  <  ven  business  men 
<i.  are  sometimes  deceived  into  the  belief  that  there  is  ultimate 

7.  securit}T  somewhere  back  of  the  double  or  triple  or  quadruple 

8.  system  of  hypothecation.     The  panic  of  '•:)  induced  a  salutary 
0.  caution,  and  it  is  not  so  easy  just  now  as 

10.  it  was  a  few  years  ago  to  sell  the  "  seven-thirty 


WHAT    TO   DO   WITH   SAVINGS.  71 

1.  gold  bonds"  of  unbuilt  or  partially  built  railroads  which,  when 

2.  finished,  are  to  run,  as  a  Congressman  once  put  it, 

3.  "through   thousands   of  miles   of   trackless   wilderness,    where 

4.  heard  save  the  scream  of  the  savage  and  the  howl         [naught  is 

5.  of  the  wild  beast."     But  there  are  bubble  bonds  still 

6.  in  the  market.     There  are  still  temptations  enough  for  small 

7.  and  large  investors,  and  hence  the  owner  of  small  or 

8.  moderate  sums  of  money  cannot  exercise  too  much  caution  in 

9.  choosing  investments.     Let  him  remember  that  the  principle  is  the 
10.  same  in  all  cases,  however  details  may  differ ;  that  money 

1.  is  worth  no  more  than  the  market  rate;  that  borrowers 

2.  who  pay  more,  either  directly  as  interest,  or  indirectly  by 

3.  selling  their  bonds  for  less  than  their  face,  do  so 

4.  because  they  are  not  safe  borrowers ;  that  really  sound  and 

5.  safe  securities  do  not  go  begging  for  purchasers;  that  high 

6.  interest  is  paid  only  as  a  compensation  for  poor  security. 

7.  Bankers  call  a  certain  class  of  investments  "women's  securi- 

[ties,"  for 

8.  the  reason  that  cautious  bankers  always  advise  their  purchase  by 

9.  people  having  the  money  of  widows  or  single  women  to    [safety 
10.  invest.     They  are  eminently  safe  securities,  and  their  absolute 

1.  is,  in  such  cases,  a  full  compensation  for  the  smallness 

2.  of  the  interest  they  bear.     Now,  for  people  who  have 

3.  saved  a  little  money  by  close  economy,  there  can  be 

4.  no  better  course  than  to  put  it  into  "women's  securities," — 

5.  namely,  government  bonds  and  the  stocks  of  some  well-managed, 

[steady-going 

6.  corporations.     These  are  always  worth  their  cost ;  they  pay  a 

7.  small  interest  punctually  and  surely ;  and  they  are  perfectly  safe. 

8.  There  is  not  the  smallest  chance  of  speculation  in  the 

9.  purchase  of  such  securities,  but  there  is  perfect  safety,  which 
10.  to  people  not  stock-jobbers,  is  greatly  better.     *[  The  third  point 


HOW  TO   MAKE  A   LIVING. 


1.  to  be  considered  in  determining  how  savings  shall  be  invested 

2.  is  the  question  of  convertibility.     Shall  we  put  our  mone)T 

:}.   where  we  can  readily  reconvert  it  into  money  or  where    [answer 

4.  such  reconversion  will  require  time  and  involve  trouble?     The 

5.  to  this  will  depend  upon  the  circumstances  and  character  of 

('..  the  investor.     If  you  know  yourself  to  be  weak  of  [you 

7.  purpose  and  likely  to  spend  money  unnecessarily  upon  impulse, 

8.  owe  it  to  yourself  to  place  as  many  obstacles  as 

9.  possible  in  your  own  way  in  this  matter;  to  fortify 
10.  your  purpose  by  every  means  in  your  power;  and  it 

1.  will  be  much  better,  in  such  a  case,  to  put 

2.  your  savings  where  you  cannot  readily  get  at  them  for 

3.  the  purpose  of  spending  them.     Invest  them  in  land,  or 

4.  in  some  other  way  put  them  out  of  easy  reach, 

5.  so  that  no  temporary  pressure  of  circumstances  may  induce  you 
G.  to  spend  the  money  you  have  laid  away.     Except  in 

7.  cases  of  this  kind,  however,  there  are  many  advantages  in 

8.  keeping  one's  money  within  easy  control,  and,  other  things  being 

9.  equal,  those  investments  are  best  which  leave  the  investor  free 
10.  at  any  time  to  recall  his  money  into  his  own 

1.  hands.     But  it  is  not  every  one  who  can  safely 

2.  trust  himself  with  this  power  over  money  of  which  he 

3.  is  likely  to  feel  the  need  constantly.     It  is  not 

4.  every  one  whose  self-mastery  is  sufficient  to  guard  to-day's  savings 

5.  against  to-morrow's  desire  to  spend;  and  so,  the  savings  banks 

6.  would  fulfil  their  mission  much  better,  if  they  would  uniformly 

7.  enforce  their  rule  against  the  withdrawal  of  deposits  on  demand. 

8.  People  who  need  the  encouragement  offered  by  these  institutions 

9.  induce  them  to  save  money,  are  apt  to  need  all  [to 
10.  possible  inducements  to  keep  their  savings.     1[  There  is  a  good 


WHAT  TO   DO   WITH   SAVINGS.  73 


1.  deal  of  nonsense  talked  every  day  on  the  subject  of 

2.  owning  one's  home.     A  good  deal  of  not  very  wholesome 

3.  sentiment  concerning  it  finds  its  way  into  the  columns  of 

4.  the  weekly  newspapers,  and  it  is  especially  important  to  guard 

5.  against  sentimental  illusions  in  deciding  a  question  of  such  vital 

6.  importance.     And  at  first  glance  it  would  seem  evident  enough 

7.  that  any  one  able  to  pay  cash  for  a  home 

8.  and  own  it  free  of  debt,  can  afford  to  live 

9.  in  his  house  and  ought  to  do  so ;  but  this 

10.  is  not  necessarily  the  case,  and  there  are  many  instances 

1.  in  which  even  absolute  and  debt-free  ownership  has  wrought  dis- 

2.  in  men's  affairs.     In  the  first  place,  the  owner  of  [aster 

3.  a  home  must  take  upon  himself  some  portion  of  the 

4.  risk  incident  to  ownership.     His  house  may  be  destroyed  by 

5.  fire,  and  while  insurance  protects  him  in  some  measure,  it 

6.  affords  only  an  incomplete  protection.    The  destruction  of  his  home 

7.  must  entail  considerable  loss  upon  him,  and  only  those  who 

8.  can  afford  to  take  the  risk  of  such  loss  can 

9.  afford  to  own  their  residence.     A  more  important  consideration  is 
10.  the  withdrawal  of  money  from  one's  business  for  the  purpose 

1.  of  buying  a  house.     The  ownership  of  a  home  seriously 

2.  embarrasses  many  a  business  man,  and  oftentimes  makes  utterly 

[profitless 

3.  a  business  which  else  might  4iave  brought  permanent  prosperity  to 

4.  its  head.     You  cannot  afford  to  buy  a  home  with 

5.  money  which  you  need  in  your  business.     It  is  in 

6.  the  last  degree  dangerous  to  attempt  it.     Still  more  dangerous 

7.  is  the  common  practice  of  buying  houses  on  credit  and 

8.  pa}*mg  for  them  in  instalments.     That  this  is  the  easiest 

9.  way  of  purchasing  there  can  be  no  doubt,  and  in 
10.  many  cases  the  making  of  such  a  purchase  is  the 


74  HOW  TO   MAKE  A   LIVING. 


1.  very  wisest  thing  that  can  be  done,  inasmuch  as  the 

2.  necessity  of  meeting  payments  acts  as  a  stimulus  to  exertion 

o.  and  economy,  strengthening  a  weak  resolution  to  save,  checking  a 

4.  tendency  to  spend,  which  otherwise  might  be  irresistible.     In  Mich 

5.  cases  -no  consideration  of  prudence  should  be  allowed  to  stand 

0.  in  the  way  of  the  purchaser.     The  man  who  cannot 

7.  control  his  disposition  to  spend  his  money  as  fast  as 

8.  he  makes  it,  takes  no  real  risk  in  bm'ing  a 

9.  house  on  these  terms.     If  he  fails  in  the  end 
10.  and  loses  what  he  has  paid,  he  is  no  worse 

1.  off  than  if  he  had  refrained  from  buying  and  had 

2.  spent  his  money  in  other  ways ;  while  if  he  succeeds 

3.  in  paying  for  the  house  he  will  have  bought  it 

4.  practically  for  nothing.     But  such  a  purchase  is  attended  with 

5.  some  dangers.     The  death  of  the  producing  member  of  the 

6.  family  before  the  final  payments  are  made,  or  any  other 

7.  occurrence  which  stops  the  income  in  whole  or  in  considerable 

8.  part,  may  cause  the  loss  of  all  that  has  been 

9.  paid,  just  when  such  loss  is  most  insupportable.     This  danger 
10.  may  be  guarded  against,  so  far,  at  least  as  the 

1.  death  of  the  producing  member  is  concerned,  by  the  taking 

2.  out  of  an  extra  policy  of  life  insurance  for  an 

:>.  amount  equal  to  the  unpaid  purchase  money.     In  that  case, 

4.  the  failure  of  anticipated  production  by  the  death  of  the 

5.  producer  is  offset  by  the  maturing  of  a  life  insurance 

»'».  policy.     In  other  words,  the  risk  of  losing  the  payments 

7.  made  in  consequence  of  the  death  of  the  head  of 

8.  the  family,  may  be  transferred  from  the  family  to  a 

9.  life  insurance  company,  and  prudence  dictates  that  it  should  be 
10.  so  transferred  in  every  case.     f  The  advantages  of  owning  one's 


WHAT  TO   DO   WITH   SAVINGS.  75 


1.  house  are  so  apparent  as  hardly  to  need  stating  at 

2.  all.     One  who  lives  in  his  own  house  is  independent 

3.  of  landlords  and  free  from  the  necessity  of  providing  at 

4.  stated  periods  for  the  payment  of  rent.     He  is  exempt          [from 

5.  from  the  necessity  of  frequently  removing  at  considerable  cost 

0.  one  house  to  another.     He  has  every  incentive  to  improve 

7.  and  beautify  and  ornament  his  home,  knowing  that  he  is 

8.  adding  beauty  and  value  to  his  own  and  not  to 

9.  another's  property.     The  moral  effect  upon  himself  and  his  family 
10.  is  a  fact  so  well  recognized  in  business  circles  that 

1.  the  ownership  of  a  home  positively  strengthens  one's  credit  and 

2.  improves  his  commercial  standing.     T  In  addition  to  all  this  it 

3.  should  be  borne  in  mind  that  if  judgment  be  used 

4.  in  the  purchase  the  homestead  will  certainly  grow  in  value 

5.  so  that  in  the  end  the  investment  will  prove  a  [should  be 

6.  positively  profitable  one.     This  possibility  of  increasing  value 

7.  considered  when  the  purchase  is  made.     The  house  should  be 

8.  so  chosen  as  to  make  its  growth  in  value  as 

9.  certain  as  possible.     It  is  well  to  remember  that  in 
10.  ordinary  cases  there  is  a  limit  to  the  rise  of 

1.  property-prices  in  the  middle  of  a  prosperous  town.     When  a 

2.  certain  point  is  reached  people  neglect  the  high  priced  lots 
:i.  in  town  for  the  cheaper  ones  in  the  outskirts,  and 

4.  so  there  is  very  much  better  prospect  of  improvement  of 

5.  prices  in  the  suburbs  than  in  the  town  itself,  particularly 

6.  if  the  suburbs  happen  to  afford  good  villa  sites.     Merchants, 

7.  manufacturers,  lawyers,  and  other  people  in  thriving  towns  grow 

8.  after  awhile,  and  as  soon  as  they  do  that  [rich 

9.  they  are  sure  to  set  up  new  residences  in  the 

10.  outskirts.     This  at  once  stimulates  the  prices  of  land  there, 


76  HOW  TO  MAKE  A   LIVING. 


1.  and  even  if  you  do  not  need  or  care  to 

2.  sell,  you  are  richer  by  just  so  much  as  your 

3.  property  has  increased  in  market  value  on  account  of  this      [the 

4.  improvement  in  the  character  of  the  neighborhood.     *  If  possible, 

5.  home  once  bought  should  be  kept;  but  the  profit  incident 
» 

0.  to  the  advance  in  price  may  be  secured  and  turned 

7.  into  actual  money  while  the  house  remains  untouched.    In  buying 

8.  you  have  only  to  buy  more  land  than  you  want, 
'.».  and  where  land  is  cheap,  as  it  usually  is  in 

10.  some  part  of  a  town's  outskirts,  this  may  be  done 

1.  easily  enough.     Your  house  should  be  so  placed  that  the 

2.  land  may  be  divided  at  any  time,  and  after  you 

3.  have  enjoyed  the  use  of  more  ground  room  than  you 

4.  need,  for  ten  or  a  dozen  years,  a  time  is 

5.  almost  sure  to  come  when  you  may  sell  off  the 

6.  unnecessary  part  at  a  handsome  profit.     In  the  vicinity  of 

7.  New  York,  where  the  overflow  from  the  city  has  covered 

8.  every  available  spot  for  scores  of  miles  in  all  directions, 

9.  many  men  have  secured  homes  at  little  cost  or  no 
10.  cost  at  all  by  the  exercise  of  good  judgment  in 

1.  1his  way.     If  B was  a  merchant's  clerk,  whose  income  was 

2.  not  greatly  in  excess  of  his  absolutely  necessary  expenses.     He 

3.  bought  two  acres  of  ground  in  one  of  the  New 

4.  Jersey  towns  near  the  city,  agreeing  to  pay  eight  hundred 

5.  dollars  for  it,  in  monthly  instalments  of  twenty  dollars  each, 

6.  with  interest  at  seven  per  cent.     A  building  lot  was 

7.  all  he  wanted,  but  he  knew  he  never  could  pay 

8.  for  his  house  out  of  his  earnings,  and  it  was 

0.  his  plan  to  make  n  lioiiso  bv  his  investment.     By 
10.  close  economy  he  succeeded  in  paying  for  the  land  in 


WHAT  TO   DO   WITH   SAVINGS.  77 


1.  two  years,  having  anticipated  payments  whenever  he  could.     He 

2.  a  little  later  to  dig  his  cellar  and  build  his  [managed 

3.  foundation  wall.    Meanwhile,  his  land  had  enhanced  in  value,  and 

4.  was  worth  two  thousand  dollars.     He  was  unwilling  to  sell 

5.  any  part  of  it  yet,  however,  but  he  had  no  [money 

6.  difficulty  in  borrowing  four  thousand  dollars  upon  mortgage,  the 

7.  to  be  given  him  as  he  should  need  it  in 

8.  the  building  of  his  house.     The  land  alone  was  worth 

9.  about  two  thousand  dollars,  and  with  a  house  worth  four 
10.  thousand  dollars  on  it,  it  was,  of  course,  good  security 

1.  for  more  than  the  loan.     He  built  his  house  thus  [penses 

2.  with  borrowed  money,  and  moved  in,  thereby  lessening  his  ex- 

3.  somewhat  by  saving  rent  and  cultivating  his  own  garden.     Three 

4.  years  later,  while  his  mortgage  had  still  two  years  to 

5.  run,  he  sold  all  the  land  except  the  lot  upon 

<>.  which  his  house  stood  for  five  thousand  four  hundred  dollars, 

7.  paid  his  debt,  and  found  himself  the  owner  of  a 

8.  comfortable  sum  of  money,  besides  a  house  and  lot  worth 

9.  five  or  six  thousand  dollars.     For  this  he  had  actually 
10.  paid  only  about  a  thousand  dollars,  saved  out  of  his 

1.  earnings.     He  had  thus  accomplished  by  a  bit  of  good 

2.  management  what  he  never  could  have  accomplished  by  direct 

[effort. 

3.  Scores  of  similar  cases  have  occurred  around  the  metropolis,  and 

4.  something  like  this  may  be  done  in  the  neighborhood  of 

5.  almost  any  growing,  prosperous  city.     If  the  additional  land 

6.  be  made  to  pay  for  the  house,  it  may  at  [cannot 

7.  least  be  made  to  help,  and  in  any  case,  it 

8.  is  well  worth  while  to  bear  in  mind  this  possibility 

9.  in  buying.     If  you  build  your  house,  build  it  upon 
10.  as  large  a  lot  as  you  conveniently  can,  and  so 


78  HOW  TO  MAKE  A   LIVING. 


1.  place  it  that  you  will  be  free  to  sell  some 

2.  part  of  it  if  you  shall  ever  have  occasion  to 

3.  do  so.     If  you  buy  a  house  already  built,  buy 

4.  a  lot  or  two  next  to  it,  if  it  be 

5.  in  any  way  practicable  to  do  so.     If  you  never 

0.  have  occasion  to  sell,  it  will  not  embarrass  or  trouble 
', .  you  in  any  way  to  have  the  extra  ground.     Build 

8.  or  buj-  where  the  growth  of  your  town  is  likeliest 
'.'.  to  benefit  your  property,  and  if  you  never  have  occasion 
10.  to  sell  you  will  at  least  be  richer  by  reason 

1.  of  the  greater  market  value  of  your  homestead.     Thus  it 

2.  is  left  for  us  to  decide,  each  for  himself,  first, 

3.  what  is  the  real  end  of  the  living  which  we 

4.  would  make;  and  next,  how  we  may  accomplish  it  in 

5.  greatest  measure  and  at  the  least  cost.     One  fact  stands 

6.  out  clearly — that  the  thing  of  most  worth  is  the 

7.  individual  man  or  woman,  and  that  the  wealth  of  personal 

8.  character  must  be  acquired  by  the  possessor.     Money,  material 

9.  may  be  handed  down  from  father  to  son ;  but  character,   [wealth, 
10.  to  be  really  owned  must  be  earned.     There  is  no 

1.  need,  however,  that  one  should  take  the  vow  of  poverty 

2.  in  order  to  be  a  virtuous  man  and  a  good 

3.  citizen.     It  is  possible  even  to  acquire  competence  and  yet 

4.  retain  all  the  qualities  that  inhere  in  the  true  man. 

5.  Even  the  effort  put  forth  to  earn  a  living  is 

6.  in  itself  a  power  for  good ;  for  industry  and  abstinence 

7.  are  not  merely  the  means  to  an  end ;  but  they 

8.  are  both  qualities  that,  entering  into  the  man,  make  his 

9.  life  nobler  and  his  virtues  more  enduring. 


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